Class
Copyright Ni
COIYRIGHT DEPOSIT.
Copyright. 1882.
By Thomas Y. Crowell o(/er.i, . .
A.' Fields, .
If of ton, . .
F. Spencer,
Phelps, . .
Michell, .
Cowper, . .
Dryden,
Sarqent,
H. k. White,
Bonar, . .
E. Young, .
I lor
Xll
CONTENTS.
All Earthly Joy Returns ill Pain Dunbar 20«
All in a Liifetime, Stedman, 539
All the Rivers, Phelps 416
All Things Once are Things Forever Lord Houghton, . . . 289
All Things Sweet when Prized, A. T. De Vere, ... 186
All Together, H. H. Brownetl, ... 57
Alone, H. H. Broivnell, ... 58
A Lost Chord, A. A. Procter, ... 441
A Lover's Prayer, . . . • Wyatt 677
A Love Song M. A. De Vere, ... 317
A March Violet Lazarus, 337
A Match, Sicinburne, .... 555
Ambition, O. Houghton, .... 285
Ambition, E. Young 683
Amends Richardson, .... 458
America, Dobell, 189
A Mussel Shell, Thaxter 587
A Name in the Sand Gould 238
An Author's Complaint, Pope, 765
And Thou hast Stolen a Jewel, Massey, 368
And Were That Best ? Gilder, 233
An Evening Reverie, Bryant, 80
An Epitaph, Prior, 773
Angelic Care, E. Spencer, .... .528
An Idle Poet, Robertson, 851
Annabel Lee, Poe. 423
An October Picture, Collier, 143
An Old Song Reversed, Stoddard, 540
An Open Secret Mason, 844
Answered, P. Cary, 127
Antony to Cleopatra Bytle, .'553
An Unthrift, Braddock, . .
An Untimely Thought T. B. Aldrich,
A Passionate Shepherd to his Love, Marloice, . .
A Petition to Time, B. W. Proctor,
A Picture, Street, . . .
A Picture of Pollen, Scott
Apollo Belvedere, W. 1!'. Gay, .
A Portrait, E. B. Browning,
Apostrophe to Ada, Byron, . . .'
Apiistrophe to Hope, Campbell, . .
Apostvoplie to Liberty, Addison, . .
Apostroplie to l^ight, Milton,
805
10
842
444
549
477
K20
63
105
117
3
381
Apostroplie to Popular Applause, Coirper, 157
Apostrophe to the Ocean, Byron, 100
Apostrophe to the Poet's Sister, }f'ordsn-o)'th, .... 6(i7
Apostrophe to the Sun Perriral 411
Apostrophe to the ^V^limslcal, Crabhe, 165
A Prayer in Sickness, li. W. Procter, . . . 445
April ir. Morris .390
A Protest, J. 'P. Fields, .... 226
A Question Answered, Machay, 365
Archie, ' /'. Cary, 125
A Request, Landor, .328
Argument, Tupper, 617
A Scene in the Highlands, Scott, 477
Ashes of Roses, E. Goodale, .... 237
Asking for Tears S. M. B. Piatt, ... 421
Ask Me uo More Carew, 118
Ask Me no More, Tennyson 57m
A Sleep, Prescott, 434
A Snow-Drop, Spoford, 531
A Snow-Storm, Eastman 208
A Song of Content, /. ■/. Riatt, .... 419
A Song of Doubt, Holland, 271
A Song of Faith, Holland, 272
Aspirations after the Infinite, Itenside, 7
Aspirations of Youth Montgomery, .... 384
A Spring Day, Jlloomjield, 40
CONTENTS.
xm
As Slow our Ship, -^''T'» ' ' • •
Assurance, E.D. Brotiming,
A State's Need of Virtue, Thomson, . .
A Strip of Blue Larcom, . .
A Summer INIood, "Vr'A-'^' ' " '
A Summer Morning McAai/ . . .
A Summer Noon at Sea, Mirgent, . .
A Sunset Picture, falconer, . .
At a Club Dinner, -■y"™'^' • •
At Divine Disposal, ^"!r"/.^^A • "
At Dawn, ^-f^- ■''.• f «'•*•'
A Tempest, ^''?.'%'^'''\,--
At Home, f/./v -^o***"''
A Thought, ^''^''''"' ■ • ■
A Thought of the Past, Snrf/ent, . .
A Thrush in a Gilded Cage V.'7",' , '' ', ' '
■Vt Last Stoddard, . .
At the (3hurch-gate, rhackeray, .
At the Forge, t fl'n j\ ' "
At the Last, iruJ'u
At Sea, . H.H,Brownell,
At Sea Jenmson, . .
At Sea; Moulon, . .
Auf Wiedersehen, Loircll, . . .
Auld Robin Gray, JJarnard . .
Austerity of Poetry, ^^- ArnoUi, .
Autobiography, Jiarerjial, . .
Autumn, Hoplcins, . .
Autumnal Sonnet, AUmgImm, .
Autumn Song, Hutchmson, .
Avarice, . f; Spenser, .
A Voice from Afar, Netimaii, . .
Awaking of the Poetical Faculty, An/.vr, . . •
A Welcome to Alexandra, lenmjson, . .
A Wet Sheet and a Flowing Sea Cunmngham,
A Wife, Bryden, . .
A Woman's Love, /"''.' V, ' / "
A Woman's Question, ^,- ^- ^ rocter,
A Woman's Way, Bunner, . . .
B.
Ballad,
Barbara, ....
Barbara Frietchie,
Battle Hymn of the Republic.
Battle of the Baltic,
Bay Billy, . . .
Beati llli, ....
Beatitude, . . .
Beauties of Morninj
Beautiful Death, .
Beauty's Immortality,
Becalmed at Eve, .
Beethoven, . . .
feefore Dawn, . .
Before the Bridal,
Before the Prime,
Behind the Mask, .
Belinda, ....
Bell and Brook, .
Bending between Me and the Taper,
Benevolence,
Be Quiet, Do, .
Betrayal, . . .
Beyond Recall,
Bingen on the Rhine,
Hood, .
A. Smifh,
J. G. Whittier,
Howe,
Campbell,
Gassaicaij,
Symonds,
A. T. Be Vere,
Beattiv, . .
Dry den,
Keats, . .
Clouqh, . .
Tlia'cter, .
Thompson . .
B. Taylor, .
Osgood, . .
Whitney, .
Pope, . .
S. T. Coleridge.
A. T. De Vere.
Sigourney,
Mackay,
Lanier, .
Bradley,
Xorton, .
XIV
CONTENTS.
Birds and their Loves, Thomson, 503
Blessed are They that Mourn, Bryant, 72
Books, Crabbe, 1^0
Bosom Sin, Herbert 265
Boyhood, AJlston 1!)
Break, Break, Break, Jennysmi, 584
Breatlies there the Man, *«>« 478
Breathings of Spring, •?'''"""*'', : , ' • • • ^^^
Broken Friendships S. I . Coteriih/e. . . . 13(i
Bugle Song Tennyson, 577
Burial of Sir John ISIoore, Wolfe. G65
Burns Halltck, 249
But Heaven, O Lord, 1 cannot Lose, E.D. Proctor, . . . 44K
Bvroirs Remarkable Prophecy Byron 103
By tlie Autumn Sea, Hayne, 250
By the Dead, LuiglUon 324
c.
Calling the Dead,
Calm and Tempest at Night on Lake Leman,
Calm on the Bosom of our God,
Carailoc, the Bard of the Cymrians,
S. M. B. Piatt. ... 421
Byron, 101
Hevians, 263
E. B. Lytton 839
705
4
547
840
584
206
286
639
431
308
Careless Content, Byrom, . . .
Cato's Soliloquy Addison, . .
Cayuga Lake Street, . . .
Changes, B. B. Lytton, .
Charge of the Light Brigade Tennyson, . .
Charity Dryden, . .
Charity ('• Haub\ . .
Despite All, Drummond ,
Destiny T. B. Aldrich,
Die down, O Dismal Day I). Gray,
Different Sources of Funeral Tears, E. Young,
Dirge for a Soldier, Bolcer, '.
Discontent, Thaxter,
Disdain Returned Carcir, .
Distance no Barrier to the Soul, Cowley, .
Divorced, Lord Houghton,
Doctor Drollhead's Cure, Anonymous,
Dolcino to Margaret, Kingsley, .
Domestic Happiness, Campbell, .
Door and Window, //.A'. Do/-r,
Dorothy Q., Holmes, . .
Dow's Flat, Harte, . .
Dreams li. Browning,
Drifting, Bead, . .
Driving Home the Cows, K. P, Osgood,
Dullness, Pope, . . .
Dying, BucharMU,
E.
Early Death and Fame, M. Arnold,
Early Rising Saxe, . . .
Early Summer, Hopkins, .
Easter-day, .• O. fVilde, .
Easter Morning Mace, . .
East London, M. Arnold,
Effect of Contact with the World E. Young, .
Effort the Gauge of Greatness E. Young 680
Egyptian Serenade Curtis, 181
Elegy in a ('(umlrv Churchyartl, T. Gray 240
End of all Earthly Glory Shakespeare, .... 487
Endurance, . . " Allen, 14
Entered into Rest Bolton, 805
Enviable Age, S. Johnson, . . . . 30K
Epistle to Augusta Byron 95
Epigram, f!- T. ColerUhje, . . 711
Epitaph Hervey, 1^68
Epitaph D. Jonson 310
Epithalamium, BrainanI,
Equinoctial Whitney,
Equipoise, Preston,
Estrangement through Trifles, Moore, 385
Evelyn Hope B. Broivniny. ... 69
Evening, Croly 178
Evening, Wordswortli 675
Evening'Prayer at a Girls' School, Hemans, 26:2
Evening Song Lanier, 328
636
434
Eventide, ."'. Burbulge,
Every Day, Allen, .
Excessive Praise or Blame, Pope,
Excess to be Avoided, Thomson,
Exhortation to Marriage,
Exile of Erin,
External Impressions Dependent on the Soul's Moods,
Extract from " A Reverie in the Grass,"
Extracts from Miss Biddy's Letters
... 809
... 17
... 433
... 596
Bogers, 461
Campbell 112
Crahbe, 167
MacLay 365
Moore 760
479
739
740
606
485
F.
Faciebat, Abbey 2
Fair and Fifteen Bedden, 848
Fair and Unworthy Ayton. 798
Faith, . .- Kenible, 318
Faith in Doubt, Tennyson, 575
Faith in Unfaith, Scott, . .
Faithless NeUie Grav, Hood, . .
Faithless Sally Brown, Hood, . .
Falling Stars, Trench, . .
False Appearances, Shalcespenre
False Terrors in View of Death E. Yoking, 682
Fame, B. B. Lytton, . . . 753
Fancy, Keats 311
Fantasia Spofford, 530
Fare Thee Well, Byron, 92
Farewell, Symonds, 559
Farewell, Thaxter, 586
Farewell, Life, Hood 283
Farewell of the Soul to the Body Sigourney 499
Farewell, Renown, Dobson, 190
Farewell to Nancy, Burns 84
Fatherland and IVIother Tongue, Lover, 748
Father Molloy Lover, 748
Fear no More, Shakespeare, .... 488
Fear of Death Shakespeare 487
February Morris, 389
Few in Many, B. B. Lytton, ... 752
Field Flowers, Campbell, ill
Fingers, Ao//, ••, ,•
First Appearance at the Odeou J. T. Fields,
Five, : J. C. B. Don
Florence Nightingale, E. Arnold,
Florence Vane ^- J'- Cooke,
Flower and Fruit, Thomas,
Flowers without Fruit,
836
227
195
2^*
151
853
Newman, 396
Folly of Litigation, Crahbe, 164
For a Servant, Wither, ...... 6C3
For a' Tliat and a' That, JIurns, 82
For a Widower or Widow, Wither, 662
Forbearance, Emerson, 215
Forget Me Not, Sarr/ent, 469
Foreliiiowletltte Undesirable, Tupper, 620
Forever, . " O'Jieilh/, 400
Forever Unconfessed, Lord Houghtoti, . . . 288
Forever with the Lord, Montgomerij, .... 385
For his Child's Sake, Tennyson, 577
For my own Monument, Prior, 772
France Goldsmith, .... 236
Friend after Friend Departs, Montgomery, .... 384
Friendship, Simms, ,503
Friendsliip in Age and Sorrow, Crahbe, 168
Fritz and I C. F. Adams, .... 686
From " Absalom " Willis, 654
From " An Ode to the Rain," S. T. Coleridyc, . . . 710
From " A Preacher," Webster, 62;»
From a " Vision of Spring in Winter," Swinburne, 552
From a Window in Chamouni, Moulion, 846
From " Childhood," Faiu/han, 622
From " Christmas Autiphones," Sivinburne, .... 556
From " Dejection," S. T. Coleridtje, . . ., 136
From " Eloisa to .-ibelard," Pope,. . .'. . . . 429
From Far Marston 843
From Friend to Friend, Stimonds, 560
From " Intimations of Immortality," Wordsivorth, .... 670
From " Lines composed in a Concert Room," .... S.T.Coleridge,. . . 710
From " Ij^ies to a Louse," Burns, 698
From " Making Poetry," Harergal 826
From ]\lire to Blossom, S. Longfclloic, . . . 346
From " No .\ge is Content," Earl of Surrey, . . . 551
From " Nothing to Wear," Jl'. A. Butler, . . . . 701
From " Poverty," Wither 662
From " Rules and Lessons," Vaiighaii, 024
From " St. Mary Magdalen," Vau'ghuii 622
From " The Christian Politician," Vavghun 623
From " The Cock and the Fox," JJri/den 722
From the " Elixir," Herbert, 827
From the " Exequy on his Wife," King, 836
From the Flats, Lanier, 328
From the '' Lay of Horatius," Macaulay 354
From " The Ode on Shakespeare," Sprague 534
From " The Sensitive Plant," Shelley, 493
From "The Thief and the Cordelier," Prior 774
From "To a Lady with a Guitar," Shelley, 495
G.
Ganging to and Ganging frae, E. Coo!:, l.W
Garden Song, Tennyson, 580
Genius, Byron, 99
George Eliot, Phelps, 416
Glasgow A. Smith 505
Gleaner's Song, Bloomjield, 43
God's Patience, Preston, 435
God, the only Just Judge, Burns, 85
Goethe (^Memorial Verses) M. Arnold, .... 25
Go, Forget me, Wolfe 665
Go not, Happy Day, Tennyson, 581
Good Counsel, Chaitrcr, 811
Good Life, Long Life, " . . . Johnson 310
Good Counsel of Polonius to Laertes, Shal.'es/ieare, .... 485
Good Morrow, Heyirood, 268
Goodness E. B. Browning, . . 688
CONTENTS.
Good News,
GoodNiglit,
Gray,
Greece,
Green Things Growing, . . .
Grief for the Loss of the Dead,
Guardian Spirits,
Gulf-weed,
Klmhall, 31f>
Hhelh'ii, 4!)5
Ticknor, 854
JJyirm, 105
t'raik, 170
Quarles 451
Rogers, 464
Fenner, 224
H.
Hallowed Ground,
Hand in Hand with Angels
Hannah Binding Shoes,
Happiness
Happiness in Little Things of the Present, ....
Happy are They,
Hark "to the Shouting Wind
Harmosan,
Harsh Judgments,
Harvesting,
Harvest Time,
Health Necessary to Happy Life,
Heart Essential to Genius
Heart-glow,
Heart Oracles
Heart Superior to Head,
Heaven near the Virtuous,
Heliotrope
Helvellyn, . . .
Her Conquest,
Hereafter,
Heroes,
Her Roses
Hester,
Hie Jacet,
Hidden Joys,
Hidden Sins
Highland Mary,
Hints of Pre-existence,
History of a Life,
Hohenlinden,
Homage,
Home and Heaven
Home, Wounded,
Hope,
Hope for All . .
Htipe in Adversity,
How are Songs Begot and Bred ? . . .
How Cyrus laid the Cable,
How Delicious is the Winning,
How the Heart's Ease tirst Came,
How they Brought the Good News from Ghent to Aix,
How to Deal with Common Natures
Hudson River,
Humanity,
Husband to Wife,
Hymn before Sunrise in the Valley of Chamouui, . .
Hymn for Anniversary Marriage Days,
Hymn from " Motherhood,"
Hymn to Trust,
Hymn to Contentment,
Hymn to Cynthia,
Hymn to the Flowers, .
Campbell -108
Larcom, 332
Larcnm, 329
Mackaij, 757
Trench, C05
A. T. I)e Vere, . . . 185
Tim roil, 855
Trcvch CO(i
Fabcr, 21G
B/oomfield, .... 41
Thomson 592
Th'nni/so7i, 579
S. T.' Coleridge, . . . 138
Withers 662
Hopkins, 829
Holmes, 279
Parnell, 407
Jonson, 310
H. Smith, 510
CONTENTS.
I.
I Count my Time by Times that I Meet Thee Gilder, 232
Ideals Fmocett, 219
1 Die for tliv Sweet Love, li. W. Procter, . . . 446
If M. n. Smith, .... 513
It it :\Iust Be, n. Gray, S22
If tliis Be All, A. Bronte, 53
If 'J'hou Wert by my Side, Hcber, 258
If We Had but a Day, Dickinson, 188
If You Love me L. Clark, 128
I in Thee and Thou in Me, Cranch, 176
Ilka Blade o' Grass Keps its ain Drap o' Dew, .... Ballanfinc, .... 28
111-choseu Pursuits, Tupper, 614
111-ehristened, Tnpper, 618
II Penseroso, Milton 376
Imagined Reply of Eloisa, Howe, 2S9
I'm Growing Old, Saxe 474
Imitation, BicharcUon, .... 459
Immortality M. Arnold 24
I'm not a Single Man, Hood 737
Impressions du Matin O. Wilde, 648
In a Graveyard, . Hay, 253
In a Letter Jennison 8.32
In an Hour, Perry, 415
In Arabia J. B. Bensel, .... 38
In Autumn, Boker, 804
In a Year R. Browning, .... 68
In Blossom Time Coolbrith 153
Incompleteness, A. A. Procter, . . . 443
Independence, Thomson,
I Never Cast a Flower away.
V. B. /Soiifheij, . . . .515
In Extremis, J. T. Fields,
Influence Coolidge, 814
In (iartield's Danger, Brackett ,52
Ingratitude, , , " , Shakespeare, .... 484
In Kittery Churchyard Thaxter 589
In Memory of Barry Cornwall, Swinbvrne, .... 5.52
In no Haste, Landor, 327
In November, P. U. Johnson. . . . 8.34
In Praise of his Lady Love Compared with all Others, , £arl of' Svrreij, . . . 551
In School Days J. G. Uniittier, ... 640
Ins<:-riiition, Byron, 94
Insisniticant Existence, Watts, 8,55
InStiuiigle E. B.Browning, . . 67
Insufficiency of the World, E. Young 680
In the Dark, G. Arnold 23
In the Meadows, B. Taylor, 566
In the Quiet of Nature, Cotton, 154
In View of Death M. Collins, .... 144
Invocation, Riordan 850
I prithee Send me back my Heart, Suckling, 5.50
I Kemember, I Kemember, Hood, '. 280
Irwin Russell, Btmner, 808
I Saw from the Beach, Moore, 387
Is it all Vanity E. B. Lytton, .... 838
Isolation, E. Gray, 240
I Wandered by the Brookside, Lord Houghton, . . . 287
I will Abide in thine House, Whitney, 638
I will not Love, . Landor, 328
J.
Jasmine Hai/ne, . .
Jeanie Morrison, Mothenvell,
Jerusalem the Golden, „ Massey, . .
257
392
367
CONTENTS.
Jesus, Lover of my Soul,
Wesley, 632
John Anderson my Jo, Burns, 84
John Gilpin Cowper, 711
Jim Bludso of the Prairie Belle Hay, 731
John Day, Hoocl, 735
Joy to be Shared, £■ Young. , . . • . 978
Judge Not, A. A. Procter, . . . 440
Judgment in Studying it, Dryden, 205
July Jackson, 831
June, Bryant, 73
June, Loiveil, 351
Just Judgment, Pope, ...... 432
Justice Richardson 459
Justice the Regenerative Power, E. B. Lytton 839
K.
Keep Faith in Love, Miller, 374
Kilcoleman Castle, Joyce, 834
Kiudness tirst Known in a Hospital, E. B. Browning, , . 66
L.
Labor Lord Houghton, . . . 286
Laborare est Orare, . , F. S. Osgood, . . . 402
Lady Clara Vere de Vere • . . Tennyson 583
Lagrimas, . - Hay 255
Lake George, Hi/lard, 269
L'Allegro, Milton, 375
Landing of the Pilgrims Hemans, 263
LarvtB • Whitney, 638
Last Allen, 15
Last Lines, E. Bronte, 54
Last Verses, M. Collins 144
Last Verses, Motherwell, .... 391
Last Words S. M. B. Piatt, ... 419
Late Summer, Hojjkins, 829
Late Valuation, Tapper, 620
Laugliter and Death, Blunt, 803
Launcli thy Barli, Mariner, C. B. Soiitltey, . . . 514
Laura, my Darling, Stedman, 535
Learning is Labor, Crabhe 164
Left Behind, Moulton, 845
Letters, Tapper, 615
Life, Barbauld, 28
Life Bryant 76
Life, A. Cary, 119
Life Crabbe, 168
Life B. W. Procter, ... 444
Life, Tapper 620
Life a Victory, B. B. Lytton, .... 841
Life from Death, Holland 273
Life in Death, Savage, 472
Life's Mystery, A. Cary, 122
Life's Mystery Stoa-e, 544
Life's Tlieatre Shah/speare 484
Life's Vicissitudes, Shnlrspean, .... 487
Ijife will be Gone ere I have Lived C. Broate 54
Light, Bourdillon, .... 50
Liglit on the Cloud Snroge 473
Liglit Sliining out of Darltness, Cawjicr, 1.57
Like a Laverock in the Lift, Jcun Ingelow, . . . 307
Lilce as a Nurse, raugluin, 626
Lines on a Prayer-book, Crashaw. 816
Lines to a Comic Author S. T. Coleridge, . . . 710
CONTENTS.
Listening for God, Gannett,
Litany to the Holy Spirit, Herrick,
Little Billee, Thackeray,
Little Breeches, Hay, . . .
Little Gitfen, Ticknor,
228
266
783
730
854
Little Jerry, the Miller, Saxe, 474
562
245
61
252
59
807
428
603
111
836
817
56
468
Little Kindnesses Talfourd,
Little Martin Craghan, Gu'stafson, . . .
Little Mattie E. B. Broitning,
Lone Mountain Cemetery, Bret Harte, . .
Long Ago, . . ' H. H. Broivnell, .
Longfellow, Bunner, ....
Lord Byron, Potlok, ....
Lord, Many Times I am Aweary, Trench
Lord Ullin's Daughter, Campbell, . . .
Lord, when 1 Quit this Earthly Stage, Watts, . .
Loss Af. B. Dodge, . .
Losses Brown, ....
Lost Days, I). G. kossetti, .
Love, Botta, 50
Love, S. Butler, 87
Love Byron 97
Love S. T. Coleridge, ... 141
Love, Scott, 478
Love, Tennyson, 579
Love Bettered by Time, Hood, 284
Love, Hope, and Patience in Education, S. T. Coleridge, ... 140
Love in Age, Tilton, . . ' . . . . 598
Lovely Mary Donnelly, AUingham, .... 686
Love me if I Live, B. ]V. Procter, . . . 444
Love of Country and of Home, Montgomery , .
Love of the Country, Dloomfield,
Love Reluctant to Endanger, H. Taylor, . .
Love's Reward, Bourdillon,
Love shall Save us all, Thaxter, . .
Love's Immortality B. Southey,
Love's . Jealousy, Gilder,
Love's Sonnets,
Love's Philosophy, Shelley,
Love, the Retriever of Past Losses, Shakespeare, .
Love, the Solace of Present Calamity, Shakespeare, .
Love Unalterable, Shakespeare, .
Low Spirits, Faber, . . .
Lucy, Wordsicorth, .
Lyric of Action, Hague, . . .
. 382
. 42
. 570
. 50
. 588
. 517
. 233
Bokcr, 46
" "■ . 492
. 489
. 488
. 489
. 217
. 672
. 827
M.
Madonna Mia, O. Wilde, .."... 647
Maiden and Weathercock H. W. Longfellow, . . 343
ISIaid of Athens, Byron 94
INlajor and Minor, Curtis, 181
Make thine Angel Glad, C. !<'. Bates, .... 31
Making Peace, S. M. B. Piatt, ... 420
Man Pope, 430
INIan and Woman, Tennyson 578
Manhood, Simms 503
^ - - -- _ jjj.
. 461
. 85
. 12
. 831
. 389
. 248
. 12
. 643
Man's Dislike to be Led, Crabbe, . . .
Man's Restlessness, Pagers, . . .
Man was Made to Mourn Burns, . . .
Maple Leaves T. B. Aldrich,
March, Jackson, . .
March Morris, . . .
Marco Bozzaris, Halleck, . .
Masks T. B. Aldrich,
Maud .Muller J. G. Whittier,
May,
Cheney, 812
CONTENTS.
May, Mason 844
May and the Poets Hunt, 301
May ill Kingston Abbey, 2
May to April, Freneau, 2l!8
^Measure for Measure Spofford, 531
Melancholy, Hood, 27!)
Melrose Abbey by Moonlight, t<<-ott, 478
Memorial Hall, ." i'mnch, 174
Memory, Goldsmith 237
Memory lioyers, 463
Mene, ^leiie, Si/monds, 558
Mental Beauty Akcnside, 7
Mental Supremacy, Tiipj>er, 616
Mercy ' Sha/cespeare, .... 486
Mercy to Animals, Coicper, 160
Merit beyond Beauty, Pope, 768
Middle Life He dd enrich, .... 258
Midnight Brinvnell, 58
Midsummer Saxton 852
Midsummer, Troivbridge, .... 609
Midwinter Trowbridge, .... 608
Mine Own, Leland, 339
Miracle CooUdge, 814
Misspent time, A. De Verv, .... 184
Monterey, Hoffman, 270
More Poets Yet, Dobson, 722
Morning and Evening by the Sea, J. T. Fields, .... 225
Move Eastward, Haiipy Earth, Tennyson 585
Music in the Air, Curtis 181
Music when Soft Voices Die Shelley 492
Mutability, Shelley, 495
My Ain Countree, Demarest, 183
My Answer, Boker, 804
My Child Pierpont, 422
My Comrade and I, , Trowbridge 613
My Held is like to Rend, Willie Motherwell 391
My Life is like the Summer Kose, E. H. Wilde, .... 649
My Little Boy that Died, Craik 172
My Love is on her Way, Baillie, 27
My Mind to me a Kingdom is, Dyer, 819
My Nasturtiums, Jackson, 832
Mv Old Straw Hat, F.Cook, 150
Mv own Song, Spofford 531
My Playmate, J. G. W'hittier, ... 646
My Psalm, J. G. Whittier, ... 641
My Saint, Moutton, 845
My Slain, Pealf, 457
My Window Ivv, M. M. Bodge, . . . 191
N.
Kameless Pain, T. B. Aldrich,
Names S. T. Coleridge,
Kantasket, Clemmer, . .
Katura Naturans, Clough, . . .
Nature, H. IV. Longfellow,
Nature, Very, . . .
Nature's Joy Inalienable, Thomson, . .
Nature's Lesson, Preston, . .
Nature's Need, Sir H. Taylor,
Nature's Question and Faith's Answer, R. Soulhey, .
Nature's Keverence, J. G. Whittier,
Nearer Home, P. Cary, . .
Nearer, my God, to Thee, S. F. Adams, .
Nearing the Snow-line, Holmes, . . .
Nearness, Boker, . . .
New Life, New Love Symonds, . .
CONTENTS.
New Worlds
Night,
Night
Night Storm,
No Life Vain,
No More,
No Ring
No Spring without the Beloved,
Not at Ail, or All in All, .
Not for Naught, ....
Nothing but Leaves, . .
November,
Now and Afterwards, . .
Now Lies the Earth, . . .
Number One
O. P. Lathrop,
Lazaru.f,
J!. Soutlwij,
Simma, . .
H. Coler-idcje,
Cloucjh, . .
Car 11, . .
Shaht'speare,
Tenni/.'ioii, .
E. Eiliott, .
Alcennan, .
H. Coleridge,
Craik, . .
Tennyson, .
Hood,. . .
o.
Ode, Emerson,
Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton T. Gray,
Ode on Art, Sprac/ue,
Ode on the Death of Thomson,
Ode on the Poets, . .
Ode on tlie Spring,
Ode to a Mountain Oak,
Ode to an Indian Coin, „
Ode to Disappointment H. K. White,
Ode to a Nightingale, Keats,
W. Collins, .... 148
Keats, 311
T. Gray, 233
Bolcer 43
Leyden .339
. . 6.3.5
. . 312
Ode to Evening. ~ IV. Collins 147
Ode to Simplicitv, W. Collins, .... 144
Ode to the Brave, IV. Cnllins 14.5
Olf Labrador, Collier, 142
Of Myself, Cowley, 145
Oft in the Stillv Night, 3Ioore, 386
Oh ! Watch vou Well bv Daylight, Lorer 347
Oh ! Why should the Spirit of Mortal be proud?. . . Knox, 322
O Lassie ayont the Hill, Macdonald, .... 359
Old, Hoyt, 296
Old Age and Death, Waller, 628
Old Fiiniiliar Faces Lamh 325
O may I -loin the Choir Invisible G. Eliot, 2nj
On a Child, Rogers, 461
Only a Curl, E. B. Browninq, ... 65
On a Girdle Waller, 628
On a Sermon against Glory, Akenside, 4
On Completing iny Thirty-Sixth Year, Byron 107
On Doves and Serpents Quarles, 451
One by One, A. A. Proeter, . . . 440
One Presence Wanting Byrnn, 104
One Lesser Jov Coolidf/e, 81.",
One Word is too often Profaned, Shelley, 49(1
On his Blindness, MlHoti 379
Only, Haijeman, 247
Only Waiting, Marc 360
On l\lan Quarles 451
On One who Died in :May, C.Cook, 812
On Reaching Twenty-Three, Milton, 380
On Reading Chapman's Homer, Kents, 314
On Resignation, Chatterton, .... 810
On Sin, Quarles, 451
On the Blutf. , . • Hay 254
On the Death of .John Rodman Drake Hailed: 251
On the Headland B. Taylor, 564
On the Hillside, Synunuls, .559
On the Lake Webster, 631
On the Life of Man Qnarles 451
On the Reception of Wordsworth, at Oxford, .... Talfourd 56ii
CONTENTS.
On the Picture of a Child Tired of Play, WiUh, . .
OntheKighi, Holland, .
On the Koad, Hutchinson,
On the Shortness of Life, ('n)rle.ij, . .
On the Tombs in Westminster Abbey, Beaumont, .
On Time, Miltnn, . .
On True and False Taste in Music W. Col Unit,
Other Mothers, Butts, . .
O Thou who Dry'st the Mourner's Tears, Moorr, . .
Our Homestead, P. Cari/,
Our Neighbor, Spoford,
Our Own, Snnr/stcr,
. . 651
. . 275
. . 8.S8
. . 156
. . 37
. . 374
. . 145
. . 89
. . 386
. . 127
. . 530
. . 468
Ours, Preston, 434
Outof the Darli, Shurtleff, 852
Out of the Deeps of Heaven, Stoddard, 542
Outre-niort Jcnnison, 832
O ye Tears Mackay 364
Pain and Pleasure, Stoddard 542
Pairing-time Anticipated, Coirper 716
Palmistry Spoffbrd, 530
225
478
459
604
685
479
622
399
135
194
64
370
472
171
169
67
729
336
677
171
Poor Andrew, E. Elliott, 211
Power of Poesy A. T. ])e '/ere, . . . 184
Power of the World, E. Younii, 683
Prayer, Montf/omeri/, .... 383
President Garfield, //. IF. Lomifvllow, . . 837
Press on, Benjamin, .".... 799
Procrastination Tupper 621
Procrastination and Forgetfuluess of Death, .... K. Younij, 677
Progress in Denial Simms, '.' 501
Prometheus, Bjirini 01
Proposal, /;. '/'ai/lor, 565
Prospice, /?. Brmrninf/, . ... 68
Providence, Vaur/Iian 623
Pure and Happy Love Thomson, 591
Purity G. Hout/hfon, .... 286
Pursuit and Possession, T. B. Aldrich, . ■ . 11
Passage from the Prelude A. Fields,
Paternal Love, Scott, . . . .
Patience, llichardson, . .
Patience, Trencli, . . . .
Pat's Criticism, C.F.Adams,. .
Payments in Store, Scott, . . . .
Peace, Vaui/han, . . .
Peace and Pain, O'lt'eilly, . . .
Penance of the Ancient Mariner, S. T. Colerideje. .
Peradventure, J. C. B. Dorr,
Perfect Love, E. B. Broivnin//,
Persia Mitchell, . . .
Pescadero Pebldes, Sarar/e, . . . .
Philip my King Craik, . . . .
Philosophy Crabhe
Picture of" Marian Erie, E. B. Broicninej,
Plain Language from Truthful James, Bret Ilarte, . .
Pleasant Prospect, La:iarus, . . .
Pleasure Mixed with Pain, W>iatt, . . . .
Plighted Craik
Q.
Quaclt, Crabhe, 71s
Quakerdom Halpine 726
Quebec at Sunrise, Street, 545
CONTENTS.
Quebec at Sunset,
Questionings,
Quince, ....
Street 545
Hedge, ^59
Praed TTI
K.
Railroad Rhyme, . . .
Rain,
Rattle the Window, .
Reading the Milestone,
Real Estate, ....
Reason an aid to Revelation,
Rebecca's Hvmn, ....
Recognition of a Congenial Spirit,
Recompense, . . .
Recompense, . . .
Recompense, . . .
Recompense, . . .
Reconciliation, . .
Refuge from Doubt,
Regret,
Relaxation, . . .
Remedial Sutfering,
Remember, . . .
Remember, . . .
Repose,
Remembrance, . .
Remorse, ....
Rencontre, . . .
Reporters, . . .
Requiescat, . . .
Reverie, ....
Resigning,
Richard's Theory of the Mind,
Riches of a Man of Taste,
Ring out, Wild Bells, .
Ripe Grain, . .
Rock me to Sleep,
Rondel, ....
Rory O'More, .
Rosaline, . . .
Rose Aylmer,
Rubles
Rule, Britannia,
Saxe, . .
Burleigh, .
Stoddard, .
J. J. Piatt,
Trowbridge,
Cotrley, . .
Scott, . .
Moore, . .
Annan, . .
Simms, . .
Pit/er. . .
Tilt'm, . .
Ten nyson, .
Miller, . .
O. Houghton,
H. Taijlor, .
P. Soufheg,
Lazarus,
C. G. Possetti
TItomson, .
E. Bronte, .
Hay, . . .
T. B. Aldrich,
Crahbe, .
O. Wilde,
Thaxter,
Craik,
Prior,
Akenside,
Tennyson,
Goodale,
Allen, .
Pay, . .
Lorer,
Lodge, .
Landor, .
Landor, .
Thomson,
s.
Sabbath Morning •
Sadness Born of Beauty, . . .
Sailor's Song,
Saint Peray ■
Sands of Dee,
Saturday Afternoon, . . . ,
Scene after a Summer Shower,
Schnitzerl's Philosopede, . . .
Scorn not the Sonnet, . . . ,
Sea-way,
Secrets,
Seeking the Mayflower, . .
Self,
Self-dependence,
Selfishness of Introspection, .
Serve God and be Cheerful, .
She and He,
Shelling Peas,
Grahame, . .
Trench, . . .
G. P. Lathrop,
T. W. Parsons,
Kingsley, . .
Willis, . . ■
Korton, . . .
Lfland, . . .
Wordsworth, .
Hutchinson, .
Wheeler, . .
Stefbnan, . .
Symonds, . ■
M. Arnold,
E. B. Broivning,
Keicell, . . .
E. Arnold,
Cranch, ...
CONTENTS.
Sheridan's Ride, Bead, 453
She's Gane to Dwell in Heaven, Cviniingham, . . . . 180
She Walks in Be-.iuty Byron, 93
She "Was a Phantom" of Delight, Wordsicorth, .... 674
Silent Mothers, Helen lUch, .... 849
Silent Songs, Stoddard 542
Silhouettes, O. U'Ude 648
Since All that is not Heaven must Fade, A'eb/e 16
Since Yesterday Lord Hounhton, . . . 286
Sir Marniaduke's Musings, Tilion, .' 601
Sir Walter Scott at Pompeii, Landon, 327
Sleep, T. li. Aldrich, ... 11
Sleep Bijron, 97
Sleep and Death, -^'i'.'/, 222
Sleep the Detractor of Beauty, Crablie, 163
Sly Lawyers, . Crahbc, 718
Snatches of Mirth in a Dark Life, JkcUtie, 27
Soft, Brown, Smiling Eves, Craiicli 176
■ " ■ '" ■ '"■ ■ " "" ' 446
501
634
323
806
509
416
513
Softly Woo away her Breath, B. 11". Procter.
Solace of the Woods, Siwvi.'i, . .
Solitude, H. K. White,
Somebody's Darling Lacoste, . .
Somebody's Mother, Brine, . .
Somebody Older, F. Smith, .
Some Day of Days, Pernj, . .
Sometime, M. li. Smith,
Somewhere, Snxe, 474
Song Camphell 115
Song Campbell, 707
Song, H. Colerid(/e, .... 134
Song, r. G'. Jloss'etli, . . . 465
Song from "Right," Harergal, 825
Song of a Fellow-worker, O'Shavf/hnessi/, . . . 404
Song of Egla, Brooh:s, ...... 55
Song of Saratoga Sa.ve, 776
Song of the Hempseed E. Cook 149
Song of the Ugly Maiden, E. Cool:, 151
Song on May Morning, Milton, 378
Songs of Seven, Ingeloir, 301
Songs Unsung, Stoddard 541
Sonnet, O. Wilde, 648
Sonnet Composed on Leaving England, Keats 311
Sonnets from " Intellectual Isolation," Si/monds, 561
Sonnet on Chillon, Bi/rnn 93
Sonnets to Edgar Allan Poe, IVhilman, 856
Sonnet to Hope Williams, 650
Sonnet to Sleep Sidney 499
Sorrows of Werther, Thach-raij, .... 783
Soul of my Soul Saryent, 469
Soul to Soul, Tennyson, 575
Sound Sleep, CO. liossetti, . . . 465
Spectacles, or Helps to Read, Byron, 706
Spf nt and Misspent, A. Car;/, 121
Spiritual Feelers Tuppe'r 615
Sipiandered Lives, B. 'I'ai/lor, 566
Stanzas from " Hymn on the Nativity," Milton, 379
Stanzas from " Ciisa Wappy," Moir 381
Stanzas from " .Service," J. T. Troicbridge, . . 612
Stanzas from " Song of the Flowers," Hunt • . . 299
Stanzas from the " Tribute to a Servant," Hou-e, 290
Stanzas from "The True Use of Music," Wesley, 6.32
Stanzas from " The Schoolmistress," Shenstone, 496
Stanzas in Prospect of Death, Burns, 83
Stay, Stay at Home, my Heart, //. W. Lon(il'ellou\. . 342
Still Tenanted Hiram Pieli 849
Stonewall Jackson's Grave, Preston, 435
Storm at Appledore, Lowell, 3.52
Strength through Resisted Temptation, Holland 273
Strive, Wait, and Pray, A. A. Procter, . . . 443
CONTENTS.
XXV 11
strong Son of C4oil, Tennyson, .... 574
Submission to Supreme Wisdom, I'ojx' 430
Success Alone Seen Landon, 326
Sufficient unto the Day, Sani/sfcr, 46S
Summer Dawn at Loch Katrine, Scott, 4T6
Summer Longings, McCarthy, oO!)
Summer Kain Bennett, 38
Sum up at Night, Hcrljcrf, 264
Sundays, J'au". Gray, 822
Wisdom, E. Young, 684
Wisdom's Prayer, Johnson, 308
Wishes for Obscuritv, Crowne, 179
Wishes of Youth, ." Blanchard, .... 801
Wit, Pope, 432
Withered Roses, Winter, 660
Without and Within, Loivell, 751
Woodbines in October, C. F. Bates, .... 31
Woodman, Spare that Tree, Morris, 388
Words for Parting Clement, 129
Work and Worship W. A. Butler,. . . . St
Worship, Richardson 458
Worth and Cost Holland 273
Wouldn't you Like to Know, Snxe, 4i.5
Would Wisdom for Herself be Wooed, Patmore, 411
CONTENTS.
Wounds Fawcett, .
Wrecked in the Tempest, Falconer, .
Written at an Inn at Henlej', Shenstone, .
Written on Sunday Morning, JR. Southeij,
220
217
498
519
Yawcob Strauss, Adams 685
Ye Mariners of England, Campbell, 110
Yield not, thou Sad One, to Sighs, Lover, 318
Young Sophocles taking the Prize A. Fields, 223
Youth and Age^ S. T. Coleridge, . . 140
Youth's Agitations, M. Arnold, .... 24
mDEX OF AUTHOKS AKD TITLES.
PAGE
2
2
1
ABBEY, HENRY.
b. Kondout. N Y., July 11, 1842.
Faciebat .......
May in Kingston ....
The Caliph's Magnanimity
ADAINIS, CHARLES FOLLEN,
b. Dorchester, Mass., April 21, 1842.
Fritz and I , . . 686
Pat's Criticism 685
Yawcob Strauss 685
ADAIMS, SARAH FLOWER,
b. Cambridfre, Enp;., Feb. 22, 1895.
d. London, Aug. 14, 1840.
Nearer, My God, to Thee ... 3
ADDISON, JOSEPH.
b. Milston, Wiltshire, Eng., May 1, 1672.
d. London, Eng., June 17, I7ia.
Apostrophe to Liberty ^ . . . 3
Cato's Soliloquy 4
AIKEN, BERKELEY.
d. 18G4.
Uncrowned Kings 797
AKENSIDE, :NrARK.
b. Newcastle-upon-Tvne, Nov. 9, 1721.
d. June 27, 1770.
Aspirations after the Infinite
(Pleasures of the Imagination)
Mental Beauty (P/easi«rs of the
Imagination^ 7
On a Sermon against Glory . . 4
Riches of a Man of Taste {Pleas-
ures of the Imagination) . . 6
The Development of Poetic
Creation (Pleasures of the
Imagination) 5
AKERMAN, LUCY EVELINA.
h. Feb. 21„ 1816.
d. Providence, R. I., Feb. 21, 1874.
Nothing but Leaves 8
ALDRICH, JAMES.
b. Orange Co., N. Y., July 10. 1810.
d. New York, Oct., 18o6. "
A Death-bed
ALDRICH, THOilAS BAILEY,
b. Portsmouth, N. H., Nov. 11, 18.36.
After the Rain
An Untimely Thought . .
Destiny JjJ
Maple Leaves 1-
Masks 12
Nameless Pain ly
Pursuit and Possession .... 11
Rencontre H
Sleep 11
The Ballad of Baby Bell ... 8
The Faded Violet H
The Rose Jp
To any Poet ......•• 12
Unsung 10
ALEXANDER, CECIL FRANCES.
b. about 1830, England.
The Burial of Moses .... 12
ALFORD, HENRY,
b. London, 1810. d. 1871.
The Aged Oak at Oakley. .
13
ALLEN, ELIZABETH AKERS.
b. Strong, i\Ie., Oct. 9, 18.32.
Lives Greenville, N. J.
Endurance . 14
Every Day H
j^j^g^ 15
Rock me to Sleep 15
Until Death 16
Where the Roses Grew .... 15
ALLINGHAM, WILLIAM,
b. Ballyshannon, Ireland, 1828.
Lives in London.
Autumnal Sonnet 18
Lovely Mary Donnelly .... 686
The Touchstone 18
ALLSTON, WASHINGTON.
b. in Waccamaco, S. C.,.Nov^5. 1779.
d. Cambridge, Mass., July 9, 1873.
19
Boyhood
ANNAN, ANNIE R.
b. Mendon, N. Y., Sept. 23, 1847.
Recompense 797
ANONYMOUS.
The Eggs and the Horses . . .
Dr. DroUhead's Cure ....
APPLETON, THOMAS GOLD,
b. Boston, March 3, 1812.
To Rouse, the Artist ....
To William Lloyd Garrison, after
the war 1^
793
796
19
XXXVlll
INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES.
AENOLD, EDWIN.
BATES, CHARLOTTE FISKE.
b. London, Eng., JS.32.
b. New York, Nov. 30, 1838.
After Death in Arabia : . . .
21
Florence Nightingale ....
22
Consecration
31
She and He
20
Make thine Angel Glad . . .
31
The Old Year and the New . .
31
ARNOLD, GEORGE.
To Victoria
31
b. New York, June 24, \SM.
d. Strawberry Farms, N. J., Nov. 9, 1865.
Woodbines in October ....
31
Cui Bono
23
23
BATES, FLETCHER,
b. New York, Nov. 19, 1831.
In the Dark
ARNOLD, MATTHEW.
The Clergyman and the Peddler
687
b. Latcham, Eng., Dec. 24, 1S22.
The Dead Bee
32
The Two Birds
32
Austerity of Poetry
25
Early Death and Fame ....
25
BATES, KATHERINE LEE.
East London
24
b. Falmouth, Mass., Aug. 12, 1859.
Goethe (Mi'tnorial verses) . . .
25
Immortality
24
The Organist
32
Self-dei;enilence
25
Youth's Agitations
24
BAYLY, THOMAS HAYNES.
AYTON, SIR ROBERT.
b. Bath, England, 1797. d. 1839.
b. Scotland, 1570. d. 1G38.
Fair and Unworthy
798
The first Gray Hair
Why don't the Men Propose . .
33
688
BEATTIE, JAMES.
BAILEY, PHILIP JAxMES,
b. Kincardineshire, Scotland, Oct. 20, 1735.
b. Nottingham, Eng., 1816.
d. Aug. 18, 1803.
The True Measure of Life . .
26
Beauties of Morning {The Min-
strel)
Death and Resui-rection {The
34
BAILLIE, JOANNA.
b. Lanarksliire, Scotland, in 1702
Minstrel)
35
d. at Hampstead, near London, Feb. 23. 1851.
The Ascent to Fame ( The Min-
My Love is on her Way . . .
27
strel) , . . .
34
Snatches of Mirth in a Dark Life
27
The Charms of Nature (The
The Kitten
26
Minstrel)
34
The Worth of Fame
26
BEERS, ETHELINDA ELLIOTT.
BALLANTINE, JAMES.
b. 1827. d. 1879.
b. Edinbur'^h Scotland 1808. d. 183.3.
The Picket Guard
.35
Ilka blade o' grass keps its ain
Weighing the Baby
36
drap o' dew
28
BEAUMONT, FRANCIS.
BARBAULD, ANNA LETITIA.
b. Leicestershire, 1586. d. March 9, 1616.
b. Leicestershire, Eng., June 20, 1743.
d. near London, March 9, 1825.
Life
On the Tombs in Westminster
Abbey
37
28
BENJAMIN PARK.
The Death of the Virtuous . .
The Sabbath of the Soul . . .
28
798
b. Demerara, Aug. 14, 1809
d. New York, Sept. 12, 1864.
Press on
779
BARKER, DAVID.
b. Exeter, Me., 181G. d. 1874.
BENNETT, WILLIAIM COX.
The Covered Bridge
29
b. Greenwich, Eng., 1820. Lives London.
BARLOW, JOEL.
Summer Rain
The Seasons
38
37
b. Reading, Conn., March 24, 175.5.
d. Zarnowickc, Poland, Dec. 22, 1812.
BENSEL, ANNIE BERRY.
To Freedom
29
b. New York City, Aug. 2, 1855.
The Lady of the Castle . . .
800
BARNARD, LADY ANNE.
b. Fifeshire, Scotland, Dec. 8, 1750.
BENSEL, JAMES BERRY.
d. May 8, 1825.
b. New York City, Sept. 30, 1859.
Auld Robin Gray
30
Ill Arjibiti
38
BARR, MARY A.
BLACKIE, JOHN STUART.
b. Glasgow, Scotland.
b. Glasgow, Scotland, 1809.
White Poppies
798
The Hope of the Heterodox . .
800
INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES.
BLAKE, WILLI AIM.
b. London, Nov. 28, 17.37.
The Tiger . . .
BLAMIRE, SUSANNA.
b. Cumberland, Eng., \~U. d. 1794.
What ails this Heart o' Mine
BLANCHAKD, LAMAN.
b. Great Yarmoutli Eug , May 15, 180.3.
d. Feb. 15, 1845.
40
Hidden Joys
The Eloquent Pastor Dead
Wishes of Youth ....
BLOOMFIELD. ROBERT.
BOWLES, WILLIAM LISLE.
d. Aug. 12, 182S. b. Northamptonshire, Sept. 24, 1762.
d. April 7, 18.5U.
The Greenwood .51
To Time 51
BOYLE, A. B.
Widowed 805
BRACKETT, ANNA C.
b. Boston, 1836.
gQj j In Gartield's Danger 52
802 I BRADDOCK, E:\IILY A.
^Ol d. 1879.
An Unthrift 805
b. Honjngton, Enj
d. Aug. I'J, 1823.
;., Dec. 3, 1706.
A .Spring Day (The Farmer's
£0,1/)
A Tempest (The Farmer's Boy) .
Gleaner's Song
Harvesting ( Tlie Farmer's Boy)
Love of the Country ....
To his Mother's Spindle . . .
BLUNT, WILFRED (?) (Proteus).
A Day in Sussex
Cold Comfort
Laughter and Death
The Two Highwaymen ....
To One who would make a Con-
fession . -
BOKER, GEORGE HENRY,
b. Philadelphia, 1824.
Awaking of the Poetical Fa-
culty
Dirge for a Soldier
In Autumn (Book of the Dead).
Love Sonnets
My Answer (BooJc of iJie Dead) .
Nearness ( The Boolcof the Dead)
Ode to a Mountain Oak . . .
To England
BOLTON, SARAH K.
Entered into Rest
BONAR, HORATIUS.
b. Edinburgh, Scotland, 1808.
A Little While . . .
The Inner Calm . .
803
803
803
805
48
BOSTWICK, HELEN LOUISE BARRON,
b. Charlcstown, N. II., 1826.
Urvasi 49
BOTTA, ANNE CHARLOTTE LYNCH.
b. Bennington, Vt, 1820.
Love 50
The Lesson of the Bee .... 50
BOUBDILLON, FRANCIS W.
b. Woolbedding, Eng., 1852.
Light 50
Love's Reward 50
The Difference 51
BRADLEY, MARY E.
b. Easton, JIaryland, Nov 29, 1835.
Beyond Recall ....
BRAINARD, JOHN G C
b. New London, Conn , Oct. 21, 1796
d. New London, Conn , Sept 26, 1828
Epithalamium
BRANCH, MARY BOLLES.
b. Brooklyn, N. Y , 1841.
The Petrified Fern . .
.53
BRINE, MARY D.
Somebody's jNIother 806
BRONTE;, ANNE.
b. Yorkshire, Eng , 1820. d May, 1849.
If this be All
.53
BRONTE, CHARLOTTE.
b. Thornton, Yorkshire, Eng , April 21,
1816. d. March 31, 1855.
Life wnM be Gone ere I Have
Lived 54
BR0NT:&, EMILY.
b. Yorkshire, Eng., 1818. d. Dec , 1848.
Last Lines 54
Remembrance .54
BROOKS, MARIA GOWEN.
b. Jledford, Mass., 1795.
d. Cuba, Nov. 11,1845.
Song of Egla (From Zophiel)
The Marriage of Despair . .
BROWN, FRANCES.
b. Ireland, June 16, 1818. d 186i
Losses 56
BROWNELL, HENRY HOWARD.
b. Providence, R. I., Feb 6, 1820.
d. Oct 30, 1872
All Together 57
. . 58
. . 59
. . 59
. . 48
. . 58
Alone
At Sea
Long Ago
IMidnight — A Lament
The Adieu
The Return of Kane 57
xl
INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES.
BROWNELL, C. D. W.
Waiting for the Ship .... 60
BROT\Ts^ING, ELIZABETH BARRETT.
b. London. Eng., 1800.
d. Florence, June ai, 1801.
A Character {From Aurora
Lekih) 68
A Portrait 6u
Assurance {Sonnets from the Por-
tuguese) 64
Consolation M?»-o?-a Leigh) . . 63
Critics (Aurora Leigh) .... 689
Goodness (Aurora Leigh) . . . C88
Humanity (Aurora Leigh) . . 689
In €he Struggle (Aurora Leiqh) . 67
Kindness First Known in a Hos-
pital {Aurora Leigh) . . . . 66
Little jNlattie 61
Only a Curl 65
Perfect Love (Sonnets from the
Portuguese) ....... 64
Picture of Marian Erie (Aurora
Leigh) 67
Selfislmess of Introspection
(Aurora Leigh) 66
The Cry of the Human ... 65
The One Universal Sympathy
(Atirora Leigh) 67
The Sleep . '. 60
Three Kisses (Sonnets from the
Portuguese) 64
To Flush, my Dog 62
BROWNING, ROBERT.
b. Cambcrwell, Eng., 1812.
Dreams (Tlie Ping and the Book) 71
Evelyn Hope 69
How they brought the good
News from Ghent to Ai.x . . 70
In a Year 68
Prospice 68
The Lack of Children (The Ping
and the liool:\ 71
The Pied Piper of Hamelin . . 690
The Two Kisses (In a Gondola) . 70
BRYANT, WILLIAM CULLEN.
b. Cumniinston, Mass., Nov. 3, 1794.
d. New York, .June 12, 1878.
An Evening Revery (From an
unfinished Poem)
Blessed are they that Mourn .
June
Life
Thanatopsis
The Con(iueror's Grave . . ,
The Crowded Street
The Eveninu "Wind
The Frin^fd (ieiitian ....
The Future Life
The Past
BUCHANAN, ROBERT.
b. Glasgow, Scotland, 1841.
Dying 807
To Triflers (Faces on the Wall) . 807
BUNNER, H. C.
A Woman's Way .
Irwin Russell . .
Longfellow . . .
To a Dead Woman
BURBIDGE, THOMAS.
b. England, 1817.
At Divine Disposal
Eventide
808
808
807
808
808
809
BURLEIGH, WILLIAM HENRY.
b. Woodstock. Conn.. Feb. 2, 1S12.
d. Brooklyn, N. Y., Jlarcli 18, 1871.
Rain
The Harvest Call
BURNS, ROBERT.
b. near A.vr, Scotland, Jan. S.l, 17."fl.
d. Dumfries, Scotland, July 21, 17'J6.
Farewell to Nancy . . .
For a' that and a' that . .
From the " Lines to a Louse
God the only just Judge (Fr
To the Unco Guid) . .
Hijihland ISIary . . .
Jolm Anderson, my Jo .
]SIan was Jlade to Mourn
Stanzas in Prospect of Death
Tam O' Shanter . . .
To a Mountain Daisy
To Mary in Heaven . .
BUSHNELL, LOUISA.
84
82
698
85
85
84
85
83
695
83
82
Delay
BUTLER, SAMUEL.
b. Strenehani, Worcestershire, Eng., 1G12.
d. Sept. 25, 1(180.
Love
The Biblical Knowledge of Hu-
dibras (//udibros)
The Knighfs Steed (Iludihras) .
The Learning of Hudibras (Hu-
dihras)
The Pleasure of being Cheated
(Hudibras)
BUTLER, WILLIAM ALLEN.
b. Albany, N. Y., 1S25.
From " Nothing to Wear " . . 701
The Busts of Goethe and Schil-
ler • . . . . 88
Work and Worship 87
BUTTS, MARY F.
b. Ilopkinlon, R. I., 1837.
Other Mothers 89
BUTTERWORTH, HEZEKIAH.
b. Warren, R. I., Dec. 22, 18.19.
The Fountain of Youth ... 89
BY'ROM, JOHN.
b. near Manchester, Eng., 1G91.
d. Sept. 28, 17G.'!.
Careless Content 705
Spectacles or Helps to Read . 706
The Way a Rumor is Spread . 704
699
701
INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES.
xli
BYRON, LORD.
b. London, Jan. 22. 178-S.
d. Missolonghi, Greece, April 19, 1824.
Apostrophe to Ada, the Poet's
Daughter (Chiifle Harold) . . 105
Apostn iphe to the Ocean (CliiUle
Harohl) 100
Bvron's Remarkable Prophecy
\ChiUh' Harold) 103
Cahn and Tempest at Night on
Lake Lenian (Childe Harold) . 101
Critics (English Jiards) . . . 706
Epistle to Augusta 9~>
Fare Thee Well 9ii
Genius { Prop lie CI/ of Dante) . . 99
Greece (ChUde Harold). ... 105
Inscription 94
LiOve (7'lie Giaou)-) 97
Maid of Athens 94
On Completing my Thirty-sixth
Year (His last verses) .... 107
One Presence Wanting {Childe
Harold) 104
She Walks in Beauty .... 93
Sleep (The Dream) 97
Sonnet on Chillon 93
Sun of the Sleepless 92
The First Day of Death (The
Giaour) 97
The Isles of Greece (Don Juan) . 98
The Misery of Excess {Childe
Harold) 100
Vratfi-hio (Cliilde Harold) . . . 106
When Ciililncss Wraps this Suf-
fering Clay 92
CAMPBELL, TH0:MAS.
b. Glasgow, Scotland, July 27, 1777.
d. Boulogne, France, June Ij, 1844.
Against Skeptical Philosophy
(Pleasures of Hope) .... 117
Apostrophe to Hope (Pleasures
of Hope) 117
Battle of the Baltic 114
Domestic Happiness (Pleasures
of Hope) 116
Exile of Erin 112
Field Flowers Ill
Hallowed Ground ...... 108
Hohenlinden 112
Hope in Adversity (Pleasures of
Hope) . . . . ■ '.116
How Delicious is the Winning . 110
Lord Ullin's Daughter .... Ill
Song 115
Song 707
The Distant in Nature and Ex-
perience (Pleasures of Hope) . 115
The Last Man . ..'.... 109
The River of Life ...... 114
To a Young Lady 708
To the Rainbow 113
Tribute to Victoria 115
Ye Mariners of England . . , 110
CANNING, GEORGE.
b. I.nndon, April 11,1770.
d. Cliiswick, Aug. .S, 1827.
The University of Gottingen . 708
CAREW, THOMAS.
b. Devonshire, Eng., loS3. d. 1639.
Ask Me no More US
Disdain Returned 118
CARLETON, WILL.
b. Hudson, Michigan, Oct. 21, 1845.
The New Year's Baby (From
Farm Ballads) 709
CARLYLE, THOMAS.
b. Ecclefechan. Dumfriesshire, Scotland,
Dec. 4, 1795 d. Chelsea, London, 1881.
Cui Bono? 119
To-day 118
CARY, ALICE.
b. near Cincinnati, Oliio, April 26, 1820.
d. New York, Feb. 12, 1871.
A Dream 121
Counsel 121
Life 119
Life's Mystery 122
No Ring 122
Spent and Misspent 121
The Ferry of Gallaway ... 120
CARY, PHCEBE.
b. near Cincinnati, Ohio. Sept. 4, 1834.
d. Newport, R. L, July S], 1871.
Answered 127
Archie 125
Conclusions ........ 126
Dead Love 123
Nearer Home 123
Our Homestead 127
The Lady Jaqueliue 124
CHATTERTON, THOMAS.
b. Bristol, Eng., Nov. 2(1, 17.v2.
d. London, Aug. 25, 1770.
On Resignation 810
CHAUCER, GEOFFREY.
b. London, l.'SS ? d. Oct. 25, 1400.
Good Counsel 811
The Parson 810
To his Empty Purse 812
CHENEY, JOHN VANCE.
May 812
CLARK, LUELLA.
b. America.
If You Love Me 128
CLARK, SARAH D.
The Soldanella 128
CLEM]VrER, MARY ANN.
b. rtica, N. Y.,18.'!9.
Nantasket 130
Wailing 131
Words for Parting 129
CLOUGH, ARTHUR HUGH.
b. Liverpool, Jan. 1, 1819.
d. Florence, Nov. 13, 18G1.
Becalmed at Eve 131
Natura Naturans 1.32
No More 131
xlii
INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES.
COLEllIDGE, HARTLEV.
b. near Bristol, Eng., Sept. 19. I'OB.
d. Ambleside, Eng , Jan. lU, 18411.
Address to Certain Gold-flslies .
No Life Vaiu
November
Song
The Flight of Youth ....
COLERIDGE, SAMUEL TAYLOR.
b. Devonshire, Eng., Oct. 21, llTi.
d. London, July i5, 1834.
Bell and Brook ( Three Graves) .
Broken Friendships ( Christabel)
Complaint and Reproof . . .
Epigram
From an Ode to the Rain . . .
From Dejection
From Lines Composed in a Con-
cert-room
Hymn before Sunrise in the Val-
ley of Chamouni
Lines to a Comic Author . . .
Love
Love, Hope and Patience in
Education
Names
Penance of the Ancient IViariner
(Ancient Mariner)
The Ancient Mariner Refreshed
by Sleep (Ancient Mariner) .
The Ship Becalmed (Ancient
Manner
The Voices of the Angels . .
Youth and Age •
COLLIER, THOMAS STEPHENS,
b. New York, 1842.
An October Picture
Complete
Off Labrador
1.34
i:U
133
134
133
COLLINS, MORTIMER.
b. Plymouth, Eng., 1827. d. 1876
In view of Death . . .
Last ^'erses
COLLINS, WILLIAM.
b Chicliestor, Eng., Dec. 25, 1720.
d. Chichester, Eng., 1750
Ode on the Death of Thomson .
Ode to Evening
Ode to Simplicity
Ode to the Brave
On True antl False Taste in
Music
The Passions
143
143
142
144
144
COOK, CLARENCE CHATHAM.
b. Dorchester, Mass., Sept. 8, 1828.
On one who Died in May . .
COOK, ELIZA.
b. London, Eng., 1817.
After a Mother's Death . .
Ganging to and Ganging frae
My Old Straw Hat ....
Song of tlie Hempseed . . .
Song of fhe Ugly Maiden . .
1.50
1.50
1.50
14!J
151
COOKE, PHILIP PENDLETON.
b. Martinsburg, Va., Oct. 2(i, 1816.
d. Jan. 20, 1850.
Florence Vane 151
COOKE, ROSE TERRY.
b. Hartford, Conn., Feb. 17, 1827.
The Iconoclast 152
Then 153
Trailing Arbutus -152
COOLBRITH, INA D.
In Blossom Time 153
The Mother's Grief 154
COOLIDGE, SUSAN (Sarah Woolsey)
b. Cleveland, Ohio.
Influence 814
Miracle 814
One Lesser Joy 813
CORNWELL, HENRY S.
b. Charlestown, N. 11., ISPA.
The Dragon-fly 815
The Spider 815
COTTON, CHARLES.
b. Staffordshire, Eng., 16.30. d. 16S7.
Contentation 154
In the Quiet of Nature ( From
Retirement) 154
COWLEY, ABRAHAM!.
b. London, 1618. d. Chertsey, July 28, 1G67.
Distance no Barrier to the Soul
(Friendship in Absence) . . . 1.56
Of Myself 155
On the Shortness cf Life . . . 156
Reason an aid to Revelation
(Jieason) • . . 156
COWPER, WILLIAM.
b. Hertfordshire, Eng.. Nov. 26, 1731.
d. Norfolk, Eng., April 2.i, 1800.
A Faithful Picture of Ordinary
Society {Con rersation) . . . 715
Alexander Selkirk 161
Apostrophe to Popular Applause
(The 'J ask) 1.57
Descanting ou Illness (Convcrsa-
tion) 715
John Gilpin 711
Light Shining Out of Darkness. 157
Mercy to Animals (r/(e 7'«s/0 . 160
Pairing-time Anticipated . . . 710
The Captious (Conrersatwn) . . 716
The Freedom of the Good ( The
Task) 158
The Emphatic Talker ( Conversa-
tion) 715
The Poplar Field 157
The Post-boy ( The Task) ... 161
The Soul's Progress Checked
(Retirement) 161
The Tongue (Co7iversat ion) . . 714
The Uncertain Man (Conveisa-
tion) 614
INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES.
xliii
The Wiuter's Evening (The
Task) 158
To Mary . ' 162
COXE, ARTHUR CLEVELAND.
b. Mendham, N. ' , May 10, 1818.
Watchwords S16
CKABBE, GEORGE.
b. Aldboroush, Eng., Dec. 24, 1734.
d. Feb. S, 1832.
Advice to one of Simple Life
(The Patron) ....... 718
Against Rash Opiuious (Gentle-
man Farmer) 165
Apostrophe to the Whimsical
(The Villaf/e) 165
Books ( The Library) 170
Controversialists ( The Library) . 168
External Impressions Depend-
ent on the Soul's Moods (Lov-
er's Journey) 107
Folly of Litigation (Gentleman
Farmer) 164
Friendship in Age and Sorrow
(Partintj Nozir) 168
Learning" is Labor (Schools) . . 164
Life (Parting Hour) 168
Man's Dislike to be Led (Dumb
Orators 165
Philosophy (Library) .... 109
Quacks (From Physic) .... 718
Reporters (Fj-ojw the JS'^ewspaper) 717
Sleep the Detractor of Beauty
(Edward Shore) 163
Sly Lawyers (From. Latv) . . . 718
The Awful ^'acancy ( The Parish
Register) 165
The Condemned, His Dream and
its Awakening (Prisons) . . 166
The Perils of Genius (Edward
Shore) 163
The Readers of Dailies (From
the Newspaper) 717
The Teacher (Schools) .... 164
The Religious Journal (i''«)Hi the
A'ewspoper) 717
The Universal Lot ( The Library ) 169
The Vacillating Piu-pose (E'd-
ivard Sftore) 163
The Young Poet's Visit to the
KnU (The Patron) . . ■ . 719
To Critics (The Library) ... 168
Union of Faith and Reason Ne-
cessary (7'/ie i,J6;-ar(/) . . . 169
CRAIK, DINAH MARIA MULOCK.
b. Stoke-upon-Trent, Eng., 1826.
Green Things Growing .... 170
My Little Boy that Died . . . i72
Now and Afterwards .... 170
Philip Mv King 171
Plighted" 171
Resigning 172
Too Late 172
CRANCH, CHRISTOPHER PEARSE.
b. Alexandria, Va., March 8, 1813.
A Thrush in a Gilded Cage . . 173
Compensation 174
I in Thee, and Thuu in Me . . 176
Memorial Hall 174
Shelling Peas 719
Soft, Brown, Smiling Eyes . . 176
The Dispute of the Seven Days 721
Thought 175
Why? 176
CKASHAW, RICHARD.
b. Cambridgesliire, Eng. d. Loreto, Italy.
Lines on a Prayer Book . . . 816
CROLY, GEORGE.
b. Dublin, Aug., !7.S0. d. Nov. 24, ISGO.
Cupid Growing Careful .... 178
Evening 178
CROWNE, JOHN.
b. Nova Scotia, d. 1703.
Wishes for Obscurity .... 179
CUNNINGHAM, ALLAN.
b. Blackwood, Scotland, Dec. 7. 1785.
d. London, Oct. 2a, 1»42.
A Wet Sheet and a Flowing Sea 180
She's Gane to Dwell in Heaven 180
Thou Hast Sworn by thy God . 179
CURTIS, GEORGE WILLIAM,
b. Providence, R. I., Feb. 24, 1824.
Egyptian Serenade 181
Major and Minor 181
Music in the Air 181
DANA, RICHARD HENRY.
b. Cambridge, Mass., Nov. 15, 1787.
d. Feb. 2, 187y.
The Husband and Wife's Grave 181
The Soul 182
DEMAREST, MARY LEE.
My Aiu Couutree 183
De verb, sir AUBREY.
b. Limerick, Ireland, ]7Si ? d. 1846.
Columbus 184
Misspent Time ....... 184
De VERE, sir AUBREY THOMAS,
b. Limerick, Ireland, 1814.
Affliction ......... 185
All Tilings Sweet when Prized . 186
Beatitude 186
Bending Retweeu Me and the
Taper - 185
Happy Are They ...... 185
Power of Poesy (Poetic Faculty) 184
The Angels Kiss Her . 185
The Mood of Exaltation 186
De VERE, MARY AINGE.
A Love Song ....... 817
DICKENS, CHARLES,
b. Portsmouth, Eng., Feb. 7, 1812.
d. Gad's Hill, London, June 9, 1870,
The Ivy Green ...... 187
INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES.
DICKINSON, CHARLES M.
b. I.owville, N. Y., 1842.
The Children 187
DICKINSON, MARY LUWE.
If we had but a Day 188
DOBELL, SYDNEY THOMPSON,
b. Peekham, Rye, Eng., 1824.
d. Aug. 22, 1874.
America 189
Home, Wouuded 189
DOBSON, AUSTIN.
b. England, 1840.
Farewell, Renown 190
More Poets Yet 722
The Child Musician 190
The Prodigals 190
DODGE, MARY MAPES.
b. 1838.
Death in Life 191
Heart Oracles 192
My Window Ivy 191
The Child and the Sea .... 192
The Human Tie 191
The Stars 192
DODGE, MARY B.
Loss 817
DONNE, JOHN.
b. London, 157;!. d. March .31, 1G.31.
The Farewell 818
DORR, HENRY RIPLEY.
b. Rutland, Vt., Oct. 27, 1858.
Door and Window 818
DORR, JULIA CAROLINE RIPLEY,
b. Charleston, S. C, IS2.3.
At Dawn 196
At the Last ........ 193
Five -195
Peradventure 194
Thou Knowest 195
What Need? 194
What She Thought 193
DRAKE, JOSEPH RODMAN.
b. New York, Aug. 7, 179.5. d. Sept. 21, 1820.
The American Flag . . . „ . 197
DRAYTON, MICHAEL.
b. Warwickshire, Eng., 1563. d. 1631.
The Parting . , 198
Di; uanroND, william.
b. Ilawtliorndcn, Scotland, Nov. 13, 1585.
d. Dec. 4, 1(;49.
Despite All ...-.,... 198
What We Toil For . . 198
DRYDEN, JOHN.
b. Northamptonshire, Eng., Aug. 9, 1631.
d. May 1, 1700.
A Character (.4&sa/om and Aclii-
tophel) ......... 722
Alexander's Feast ..... 199
A Wife (Eleonord) 206
Beautiful Death (Eleonoro) . . 206
Charity (Eleonoro) ' 206
From ''The Cock and the
Fo.x " 722
Judgment in Studying the Bible
(He/igio Laid) 205
The Avoidance of Religious Dis-
putes (Reliqio Laid) .... 205
The Bible (Itdigio Laid) ... 204
The Light of Reason (Religio
Laid) 204
The Model Preacher (Charader
of a Good Parson) 207
The Wit {Absalom and Achito-
phd) 207
ITnder the Portrait of John
Milton 204
DUNBAR, WILLIAM.
b. Salton, Scotland, about 1460. d. about 15.30.
All Earthly Joy Returns in Pain 208
DYER, SIR EDWARD.
b. about 1540.
]My Mind to Me a Kingdom Is
EASTMAN, CHARLES GAMAGE.
b. Fryehurg, Me., June 1, 1816.
d. Burlington, Vt., 1861.
A Snow Storm
819
208
ELIOT, GEORGE (Mariax Evans Cross).
b. Warwickshire, Eng., 1820. d. Dec. 2, 1880.
O May I Join the Choir Invisible 209
ELLIOT, JANE.
b. 1727. d. 1805.
The Flowers of the Forest . . 210
ELLIOTT, EBENEZER.
b. near Rotherham. Yorkshire, Eng., March
17, 1781. d. Dec. 1, 1849.
Not for Naught 212
Poor Andrew 211
The Poet's Prayer 212
The Press . . " 211
EMERSON, RALPH WALDO.
b. Boston, Mass , May 25, 1803.
d. Concord, Mass., April 27, 18S2.
Concord Fight
Forbearance ......
0, ]rr2-
d. Altrive, Scotland, Nov. 21, 1835.
The Skylark 271
HOLLAND, JOSIAH GILBERT.
b. Belohertown, Mass., July 24, 1819.
d. Oct, 12, 1S81.
A Song of Doubt {Bitter Sweet) .
A Song of Faith " "
Cradle Song " "
Life from Death " "
On the Righi
Strength Through Resisted
Temptation (Bitter Sweet) , .
The Press of Sorrow {Bitter
Sweet)
The Type of Struggling Human-
ity {Marble Prop Iter n) . . .
To an Infant Sleeping {Bitter
Sweet)
What is the Little One Thinking
Ahout'; (Bitter Siceet) . . . 272
^yhat will it Matter? . . .275
Worth and Cost (Bitter Sweet) . 273
HOLME, SAXE. (?)
Three Kisses of Farewell ... 276
HOLMES, OLIVER WENDELL.
b. Cambridge, Mass., .Vug. 29, 1800.
A Familiar Letter to several
Correspondents 732
Dorothy Q. — A Family Portrait 277
Hymn of Trust 279
Nearing the Snow-line .... 278
The September Gale .... 733
The Two Streams ...... 279
The Voiceless 276
Lender the Violets . . . ! ! 278
HOOD, THOMAS.
b. London, May 2'!, 1799.
d. London, May 3, 1845.
Ballad 2S4
Faithless Nelly Gray .... 7.39
Faithless Sally Brown .... 746
Farewell, Life ! 2S3
I'm not a Single Man . . . . 7.37
I Remember, 1 Remember . . 2S0
John Day 735
Love Bettered by Time . . ! 284
Melancholy
Number One
The Art of Book-keeping . . .
The Bridge of Sighs
The Cigar
The Death-bed
The Double Knock
The Song of the Shirt . . . .
To a Child Embracing his Mo-
ther • . . . .
To my Infant Son
True Death
HOPKINS, LOUISA PARSONS.
b. Newburyport, April 19, 1&34.
Autumn { Peisephone) . .
Early Summer (Persephone)
December
Hymn from " Motherhood "
Late Summer (Persephone)
Tempestuous Deeps . . .
279
736
741
282
738
281
7.38
281
280
734
2S4
829
828
828
829
829
828
HOPKINSON, FRANCIS.
b. Pliiladelphia, 17.38. d. May 9, 1791.
The Battle of the Kegs .... 742
HOUGHTON, GEORGE.
b. Cambridge, Mass., Aug. 12, 1850.
Ambition {Album Leaves) . . . 285
Charity " " ... 286
Courage " " ... 285
Daisy " " ... 286
Purity " " ... 286
Regret " " ... 285
This Name of Mine {Album
Leai-es) 285
Valborg Watching Axel's De-
parture (Legend of St. Olaf's
AJrA-) 284
HOUGHTON, LORD (Richard Monckton
Milnes).
b. Yorkshire, Eng., June 19, 1809.
Al! Things Once are Things For-
ever • 289
Divorced '. 288
Forever Unconfessed .... 288
I Wandered by the Brookside . 287
Labor . . .' 286
Since Yesterday 286
The Worth of Hours .... 287
HOWE, JULIA WARD,
b. New York, May 27. 1819.
Battle Hymn of the Republic . 289
Imagined Reply of Eloisa
( Thoughts in Pere La Chaise) . 289
Stanzas from the " Tribute to a
Servant" 290
The Dead Christ 291
HOWELLS, WILLIAM DEAN.
b. Martinsville, Ohio, March 1, 1837.
Convention 292
Thanksgiving 292
The Mulberries 292
The Mysteries 292
The Poet's Friends 292
xlviii
INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES,
HOWITT, MAKY.
b. Uttoxetcr, Eng, 1804.
The Broom-Flower 294
Tibbie Inglis 295
HOWITT, WILLIAM.
b. Derbyshire, Eng., 1793. d. March 2, IS'O.
Departure of the Swallow . . 296
HOYT, RALPH.
b. New Yurk, 1808, d. 1878.
Old 296
HUNT, LEIGH.
b. Southgate, Eng., Oct. 19, 1784.
d. Putney, Aug. 28, 1839.
Abou Ben Adliem 299
Death 301
lyiay and the Poets 301
Stanzas from Song of the
Flowers 299
The Grasshopper and Cricket . 300
HUTCHINSON, ELLEN MACKAY.
Autumn Song 830
On the Road 830
Sea-way 830
The Prince 830
INGELOW, JEAN.
b. Ipswich, Eng., 1830.
Like a Laverock in the Lift . . 307
Songs of Seven 301
The Long White Seam .... 307
JACKSON, HELEN (H.- H.)
b. Amherst, Mass., 1831.
July 831
March 831
My Nasturtiums (Th<- Crn/iiri/) . 832
The Last Words " " ' . 830
JENNISON, LUCIA W. (Owen Innsley).
b. Newton, Mass., 1850.
At Sea 833
Dependence 833
Her Roses 832
111 a Letter 832
Outre-mort 832
JOHNSON, ROBERT UNDERWOOD.
b.,Washington, D. C, Jan. 12, 185.'!.
In November (From The Century) 834
JOHNSON, SAMUEL.
b. Lichfield, Eng., Sept. 18, 1709.
d. London, Dec. LS, 17S4.
Charles XII. ( Inanity of Human
Wishes) 308
Enviable Age ( Vanity of Human
Wishes) ..■..'.. . . 308
The Fate of Poverty (London) . 309
Wisdcim's Prayer {Vanity of
llinnan Wishes) 308
JONSON, BEN.
b. Westminster, London, June II, 1574.
d. Aug. 16, 1837.
Epitaph 310
Good Life, Long Life . . . • 310
Hymn to Cynthia 310
The Sweet Neglect 310
ToCelia 309
JOYCE, ROBERT DWYER.
Kilcoleman Castle 834
The Banks of Amier .... 835
KAY, CHARLES de.
Fingers 836
KEATS, JOHN.
b. London, 1795. d. Rome, Feb. 24, 1821.
Beauty's Immortality {Endy-
mion) 312
Fancy .311
Ode on the Poets 311
Ode to a Nightingale .... 312
On Reading Chapman's Homer . 314
Sonnet Composed on Leaving
England 311
The Terror of Death .... 310
KEBLE, JOHN.
b. Fairford, Gloucestershire, En"., .\pril 25,
1792. d. Bournemouth, Eng., March 29, IStiG.
Since all that is not Heaven
must Fade 316
Where is thy Favored Haunt ? . 314
Why Should we Faint, and Fear
to Live Alone '? 315
KEMBLE, FRANCES ANNE.
b. London, 1811.
Absence 317
Faith 318
KEY, FRANCIS SCOTT.
b. Frederick Co., Md., Aug. 1, 1779.
d. Baltimore, Jan. 11, 1843.
The Star-Spangled Banner . . 318
KIMBALL, HARRIET McEW^EN.
b. Portsmouth, N. H., 1804.
Day Dreaming 320
Good News 319
Heliotrope 319
The Last Appeal 320
Trouble to Lend 319
KING, HENRY.
b. England. 1591. d. lGi;9.
From the " Exequy on his
Wife" 836
KINGSLEY, CHARLES.
b. nolne, Devonshire. Eng., June 12, 1819.
d. Eversley, Jan. 24, 1875.
A Farewell 321
Dolcino to Margaret 321
Sands of Dee 321
The Three Fishers 321
KNOX, WILLIAM.
b. Roxburghe, Scotland. 1789. d. 1825.
Oil ! why ShotiUl the Spirit of
Mortal be Proutl 322
INDEX OF AUTHOBS AND TITLES.
xlix
LACOSTE, MARIE R.
b Savannah, Ga., 1842.
Somebody's Darling 323
LAIGHTON, ALBERT.
b. Portsmouth, N. H. ]82'.l.
By the Dead 324
Uniler the Leaves 324
LAMB, CHARLES.
b. London, Feb. IS, 1775.
d Edmonton, Eng., Dec. 27, 1834.
Hester 32,5
Old Familiar Faces 32.5
The Housekeeper 325
LANDOR, L.ETITIA ELIZABETH.
b. Chelsea, Eng., ia)2.
d. Africa, Oct. 10, ]8.'!8.
Success Alone Seen 326
The Little Shroud 326
Sir Walter Scott at Poiupeii . . 327
The Poet 327
LANDOR, WALTER SAVAGE.
b Ipsley Court, Warwickshire, Eng., Jan.
3(1, 1775. d. Florence, Sept. 17, 18(H.
A Request 328
Death of the Day 328
In No Haste . 327
I Will Not Love 328
Rose Aylnier 328
Rubies 327
The One White Hair .... 743
Under the Lindens 743
LANIER, SIDNEY.
b. Macon, Ga., 1842. d. 1881.
Betrayal
Evening Song
From the Flats'
329
328
328
LARCOM, LUCY.
b. Beverly Farms, Mass., 1826.
A Strip of Blue .332
Hand in Hand with Angels . . 332
Hannah Binding Shoes . . . 329
Heaven near the Virtuous (From
Hints) 333
The Curtain of tlie Dark {From
Hints) 3,30
Unwedded 330
LATHROP, GEORGE PARSONS.
b. Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands, Aug. 25, 1851.
A Face in the Street .... 3.36
New Worlds 334
Sailor's Song ! ! 3.35
The Lily Pond 3,34
To My Son 334
LATHROP, ROSE HAWTHORNE.
The Striving of Hope {Closing
Chords) 837
LAZARUS, EMMA.
b. New York, July 22, 1849.
A March Violet 3:57
Night {Scenes in the Wood) . . 337
Pleasant Prospect {Scenes in the
Wood) 336
Remember • 338
LELAND, CHARLES GODFREY,
b. Philadelphia, Aug. 15, 1824.
City Experiences (Breitmann
About Toicn) 744
Mine Own 339
Schnitzerl's Philosopede . , . 745
LEVER, CHARLES JAMES,
b. Dublin, Ireland, Aug. 31, 1806.
d. Trieste, June 1, 1872.
Widow Malone 745
LEYDEN, JOHN.
b. Dcnholm, Scotland, Sept. 8, 1775.
d. Batavia, JS. I., Aug. 21, 1811.
Ode to an Indian Coin .... 339
LODGE, THOINIAS.
b. Lincolnshire, Eng., 1556.
d. London, Sept., 1625.
Rosaline 340
LOGAN, JOHN.
b. Fala, near Edinburgh, Scotland, 1748.
d. London, Dec. 28, 17.%^.
The Cuckoo 341
LONGFELLOW, HENRY W.
b. Portland, Me., Feb. 27, 1807.
d. Cambridge, Mass., March 24, 1882.
A Day of Sunshine 345
Maiden and Weathercock . . 343
Nature 343
President Garfield 837
Stay, Stay at Home, my Heart,
and Rest 342
The Meeting 342
The Ladder of St. Augustine . ,341
The Tides .343
Three Friends of Mine .... .344
The Two Angels .344
Weariness 342
LONGFELLOW, SAJIUEL.
b. Portland, Me., June 18, 1819.
From iVIire to Blossom .... 346
LOVELACE, RICHARD.
b. Woolwich, Eng., 1018. d. London, 1658.
To Lucasta, on Going beyond
the Seas 346
To Lucasta, on Going to the
Wars 346
LOVER, SAMUEL.
b. Dublin, Ireland, 17117. d. July 6, 18(B.
Fatherland and Mother Tongue 748
Father Molloy 748
Oh ! Watch You Well bv Day-
light 347
Rory O'More 746
The' Angel's Wing 347
The Birth of St. Patrick . . . 74t)
The Child and the Autunni Leaf 347
INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES.
Widow Machree
Yield Not, Thou Sad One, to
Sighs . . . .
LOWELL, JAMES BUSSELL.
b. Cambridge, Muss., Feb. 22, ISD).
After the Burial
Auf Wiedersclien
June ((-';/(/(/■ llw Wdlows)
Storm at Ai)plt'dore ....
The Courtin' (liiylow Papers)
Tlie Generosity of Nature
( Vision of air Launfal) .
The Heritage .....
Without and Within
LUNT, GEORGE.
b. Newburyport, Mass., Dee. 31, 1803.
The Comet 8.38
LYTE, HENRY FRANCIS.
b. Ednaiii, Scotland, 171)3. d. 1«47.
Abide With Me 353
LYTLE, WILLIAM HAINES.
b. Cincinniiti, Nov. 2. 1S2G.
Killed battle Chiekamauga, Sept. 20, 1SC3.
Antony to Cleopatra .... 353
LYTTON, LORD (Edward Bulwer)
b. England, 1S05.
Caradoc, the Bard, to the Cym-
rians {h'i)t(/ Arthur) .... 839
Is it all Vaiiity 838
Justice, tlie Regenerative Power
{mc/ielicu) 839
LYTTON, ROBERT BULWER (Owen
Meredith),
b. Herts, Eng., Nov. 8, 1831.
A Character (Lucilc) . .
Changes
Fame (Liicile) . .
Few in Many " . .
Life a Victory " . .
The Cliess-board ....
The Erratic Genius (Lurile)
The Stomach of Man "
The Unfulfilled
MACAULAY, THOMAS BABINGTON.
1). Leicestershire. Eng., Oct. 25, 1800.
d. London, Uec. £8, 1850.
From " The Lay of Horatius " . 354
MACDONALI>, GEORGE.
b. Huntley, Scotland, 182.';.
O Lassie ayont the Hill. . . . 3.59
The Baby " 3.59
MACE, FRANCES LAUGHTON.
b. Orono, Me., Jan. 15. 183C.
Easter Morning 360
0..1y Waiting 360
The Heliotrope 361
MACKAY, CHARIvES.
b. Perth, Scotland, 1812.
A Question Answered .... 365
At a Club Dinner 75H
Be Quiet, do 757
Clear the Way ! 36i!
Cleon and I 362
Extract from " A Reverie in the
Grass " 3ti5
Happiness 757
O ve Tears 364
Tell me, ye Winged Winds . . .366
The Child and the Mourners . 361
The Good Time Coming . . . 363
The great Critics 757
The Liglvt in the Window . . . 363
The little Man 758
To a Friend afraid of Critics . 754
MANN, CAMERON.
b. New York City. April ."., lS.il.
The Longing of Circe .... .H42
MARLOWE, CHRISTOPHER.
b. Canterbury, Kng., Feb. 2C, 1504.
d. Dcpttbrd, June 16, 1503.
A Passionate Sheplierd to his
Love 842
MARSTON. PHILIP BOURKE.
b. London, 1850.
From Afar 843
Too Near 843
MABVELL, ANDREW.
b. Winestead, Yorkshire, Eng., March 2, 1621.
d. London, Aug. IT, 1078.
A Drop of Dew 367
MASON, CAROLINE ATHERTON.
May (From T/ie Century) ... 844
An opeu Secret " '" 844
MASSEY, GERALD.
b. Herts, Eng., May 29, 1828.
And thou hast Stolen a Jewel . 368
Jerusalem the Golden .... 367
The Kingliest Kings 368
MCCARTHY, DENIS FLORENCE.
b. Cork, Ireland, 1820.
Summer Longings 369
McKAY, JAMES I.
A Summer Morning 842
MERRICK, JAMES.
b. Reading, Eng., Jan. 8, 1720.
d. Reading, Eng., June 5, 1709.
The Chameleon 7.59
MICKLE, WILLIAM JULIUS.
b. Langholm, Scotland, 17*1.
The Sailor's Wife 372
MICHELL, NICH0L.4S.
Alexander at Persepolls . . . :!70
The Paradise of Cabul. ... 371
MILLER, ABRAHAM PERRY,
b. Ohio, Oct. 15, 18;17.
Keep Faith in Love ( Consolation) .S74
Kef uge from iJoubt '• i!76
Turu to the Helper " 373
MILTOK. JOHN.
I). London, Dec. !l, 1608.
d. London, Nov. is, iHTi.
Apostrophe to Light (Paradise
Lost) 381
II Penseroso 376
L' Allegro .375
On his Blindness .379
On Reaching Twentv-three . . 380
On Time . . . .' .... .374
Song on ]May Morning .... 378
Stnnzas from '' Hymn on the
Nativity" ....'.... 379
The Bower of Adam and Eve
{Paradise Lost) 380
To a virtuous young Lady . . 380
MITCHELL, WEIR.
The Quaker Graveyard (From
The Century) . . ' 844
MOIR, DAVID MACBETH.
b. Musselbursli, .Scotland, Jan. 5, 1798.
d. Uiiinfrics, July t;, INol.
Stanzas from "Casa Wappy " . 381
MONTGOMERY, JAMES,
b. Irvine, Scotland. No^". 4, 1771.
d. ShefHcId, April :», 1854.
Aspirations of Youth .... 384
Forever with the I.,ord .... 385
Friend after Friend Departs . 384
Love of Country, and of Home . 382
Prayer 383
The" common Lot 383
MOORE, THOMAS.
b. Dublin. Irel.ind. May 28, 17711.
d. Sloperton, Feb. L'5, lbJ2.
As slow our .Ship 388
Come, ye Disconsolate .... 387
Estrangement through Trifles
(Lalla Pookh) 385
Extracts from Miss Biddy's Let-
ters (Fudge Family in Paris) . 760
I Saw from' the Beach .... 387
Oft in the stilly Night .... 386
O Thou wlio Dry'st the Mourn-
er's Tears 386
Recognition of a congenial
Spirit (Lai la Jiookli) .... 385
The Bird Let loose 3i^6
The modern puffing System (An
Epistle to Samuel Rogers) . . 760
Those Evening Bells .... .387
Thou Art, O God 387
MORRIS, GEORGE P.
b. Philadelphia, Oct. V2. 1802.
d. New York, July 6, 18G4.
Woodman, Spare that Tree . . 388
MORRIS, WILLIAM.
b. England, 1834.
April (Earthly Paradise) . . 390
December " " . . 390
Februarv " " . . 389
March " " . . 389
JMOTHERWELL, WILLIAM.
b. Glasgow, Scotland, Oct. 13, 17117.
d. Glasgow, Scotland, Nov. 1, 18J5.
Jeanie Morrison 392
Last Verses 391
My Heid is like to Rend, Willie 391
The Cavalier's Song, 392
Thev Come ! The merry Sum-
mer Mouths ....... 394
MOULTOS, ELLEN LOUISE CHANDLER,
b. Ponifret, Conn., April IG, 1833.
At Sea 845
From a Window in Chamouni . 846
Hie Jacet 846
Left behind 845
My Saint 845
NAIRNE, LADY CAROLINE OLIPHANT.
b. Gask. Perthshire, Scotland. July IC, 17GC.
d. Gask, Oct. 27, 184.v.
The Land o' the Leal .... 394
NEWELL, WILLIA]M, D.D.
b. Littleton, Mass., Feb. 25, 1804.
Serve God and be Cheerful . . 395
NEAVMAN, JOHN HENRY,
b. London, Eng., Feb. 21, 1801.
A Voice from afar 396
Flowers without Fruit .... 396
NORTON, ANDREWS.
b. Hingham, Mass., Dec. 31, 1786.
d. Newport, R. 1., Sept. 18, 1853.
Scene after a Summer Shower . 396
NORTON, CAROLINE E. S. S.
b. Hampton Court, Eng., 1*8. d. 1877.
Bingen on the Rhine .... 397
We have been Friends Together 398
O'REILLY, JOHN BOYLE,
b. Ireland, 1844.
Forever 400
Hidden Sins 401
Peace and Pain 399
The Ride of Collins Graves . . 399
Unspoken Words 401
ORNE, CAROLINE FRANCES.
The Gold under the Roses . . 846
OSGOOD, FRANCES SARGENT.
b. Boston. Mai on Criticism) 432
From Eloisa to Abelard ... 429
Just Judgment (Essai/ on Criti.
cism) 4;!3
Man (Essai/ on Mmi) .... 430
Merit be\ond Beauty (Rape of
the Lock) 768
Submission to Supreme Wisdom
(Essn]i on Afnn) 430
The Universal Prayer .... 433
True Nobility (Essay on Afnn) . 431
Truth to Nature (Essay on
Criticism) 432
Virtue, the sole Unfailing Hap-
piness (/r.<.s«)/ wt jl/aii) . . , 431
Vt^it, (Essai/ on Criticism) ... 432
PRAED, WINTHROP MACKWORTH.
b. London, Eng,, >H02.
d. July 15, 18;».
Quince 771
The Belle of the Ball .... 769
INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES,
PKENTICE, GEORGE DEXXISON.
b. Preston, Conn., Dec. 18, 1802.
d. Louisville, Jan. 1*2, 1870.
The River in the Mammoth Cave
PRESCOTT, MARY N.
Asleep
The old Storv
To-day . . '
847
PRESTON, MARGARET JUXKIX.
b. Lexinijton, Va., 1835.
Equipoise
God's Patience
Nature's Lesson
Ours
Stonewall Jackson's Grave .
There'll Come a Day . , .
The Shadow
The Tyranny of INIood . . .
PRINGLE, THOMAS.
b. Blaiklaw, Scotland. Jan. 5, 1789.
d. London, Dec. 5, IS;'^.
Afar in tlie Desert ....
4.3.5
43.3
434
434
435
435
4.34
4L'5
43t)
435
436
PRIOR, MATTHEW.
b. Wimhiirnc-Miiistcr, En?., July 21, ICGl.
d. Cambridgeshire, Sept. IS, 1721".
An Epitaph
For mv own Jlonument . . .
From '" The Thief and the Cor-
delier " . . . ■
Richard's Theory of the Mind
(^Alma')
The wise Man in Darkness
(Solomon)
The wise Man in Light (Solomon)
PROCTOR, ADELAIDE ANNE.
b. London, Eng., Oct. SO, 1825.
d. London, Feb. 2, 1804.
A Lost Chord
A Woman's Question . .
Cleansing Fires ....
Incompleteness ....
Judge Not
One by One
Strive, Wait, and Pray
Thankfulness
Too Late
437
441
442
442
443
440
440
443
440
441
PROCTOR, BRYAN WALLER.
b. Wiltshire. En<
The Blessed Daniozel .... 467
The Sea Limits 467
RUSSELL, IRWIN.
d. New Orleans, Dec, 1879.
Her Conquest (From The Cen-
tury) 8.51
SANGSTER, MARGARET E.
b. New Rochelle, N. Y., 18.J.S.
Our Own 468
Sufficient unto the Day . . . 468
SARGENT, EPES.
b. Gloucester. JVIass., Sept. 27, 1812.
d. Dec. .il, IbSO.
A Life on the Ocean Wave . . 465
A Summer Noon at Sea . . . 471
A Thought of the Past .... 470
Cuba 471
Forget me Not 469
Soul of my Soul 469
The Spring-time will Return . 470
Tropical Weather 471
SAVAGE, MINOT JUDSON.
b. Norridgewock. Me., June 10, 18-11.
Lives Boston, Mass.
Life in Death 472
Light on the Cloud 473
Pescadero Pebbles 472
SAXE, JOHN GODFREY.
b. Highgate, Vt., June 2, 1810.
About Husbands 778
Early Rising 777
How Cyrus Laid the Cable . . 77.5
I'm Growing old 474
Little Jerry, the Miller . . . 474
Railroad Rhyme 779
Somewhere 474
Song of Saratoga 776
The Family Man 779
The Old Man's Motto .... 473
The Puzzled Census-taker . . 776
The Superfluous Man .... 77.5
To my Love 47(!
Treasure in Heaven 476
Wouldn't you Lilie to Know . 47.5
SAXTON, ANDREW BICE.
b. Middleficld, N. Y., April 5, 18.T..
Delay (From The Century) . 852
Midsummer " " . 8.52
SCOTT, SIR WALTER.
h. Edinburgh, Scotland. Aug. l.i, 1771.
d. Abbotsford, Scotland, Sipt. 21, 18'12.
A Picture of Ellen {Lady of the
Lake) 477
A Scene in the Highlands (Lndij
of the Lake 477
Breathes there a Man (Ijay of
the Last Minstrel) . . . . ' . 478
Faith in Unf aith ( The Betrothed) 479
Helvellyn 481
Love ( Lay of the Last MinJ^frel) 478
Melrose Abbey by :Moonlight
{Lay of the Last Minstrel) . . 478
Paternal Love ( Lady of the Lake) 478
Payment in Store {/•'edoauntlet) 479
Rebecca's Hymn (Icnnhoe) . . 479
Summer Dawn at Loch Katrine
(Lady of the Lake) 476
The Sun" upon the Weirdlaw-
Hill 480
The Violet 481
Wandering Willie . • . . 480
SEAVER, EMILY.
b. Charlestown, Mass., Nov. 5, 1S35.
The Rose of .Jericho .... 482
SEW ALL, HARRIET WINSLOW. .
b. Portland, Me., June 30, 1810.
Why thus Longing? 483
SHAKESPEARE, WILLIAM.
b. Strati'.. rd-on-Avon, April 23, 15G4.
d. April 2.% ICIG.
Constant Effort Necessary to
Support Fame {Troilus and
Cressida) . 4> 6
End of all Earthly Glory (7V(e
Tempest 4S7
False Appearance {Merchant of
Venice) 485
Fear no More (Cymbeiine) . . 488
Fear of Death (Measure for
Measure) 487
Good Counsel of Polonius to
Laertes (Hamlet) 485
Ingratitude {As i/ou Like It) . . 484
Life's Theatre " " . . 4.*4
INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES.
Iv
Life's Vicissitudes (/ft'nry VIII,) 487
Love, the Solace of present Cal-
amity 488
Love, the Retriever of past
Losses 489
Love Unalterable 489
Mercy (Merchant of Venice) . . 48G
No Spring without the Beloved. 489
The Horse of Adouis {Venus
and Adonis) 488
To Be, or not to Be (Hamlet) . 484
To rny Soul 489
SHELLEY, PERCY BYSSHE.
b. Field Place, Sussex. Eng.. Aiifc. 4, 1702
Drowned in the Bay of ^pl■ziu. Italv, July
8, lS:i2. ■ ■'
Death 492
From " The Sensitive-Plant " . 493
From "To a Lady ^vith a
Guitar" 495
Good-Night 495
Love's Philosophy 490
Music, when soft Voices Die . 492
Mutability 4(;,5
One Word is too often Profaned 490
The Cloud 492
The World's Wanderers . . . 492
Time 492
To a Skylark 490
SHENSTONE, WILLIAM.
b, Leasowes, near Ilales-Owen. Eng.,Nov.. I7H.
ark
SIDNEY, SIR PHILIP.
b. Fenshurst, Kent. Eng., Nov. 20, 1554
d. Arnheini, Holland, Oct. 7, 15SG.
Sonnet to Sleep 499
SIGOURNEY, LVDIA HUNTLEY.
b. Norwich, Conn., .'Jept. 1, 1701.
d. Hartford, Conn., June 10, IStiS.
Benevolence .500
Farewell of the Soul to theBody 499
The Coral Insect 500
SIMMS, WILLIAM GILIMORE.
b. Charleston, S. C, April 17, ISOC.
a. Charleston, S. C, June 11, 1.S70.
Friendship 50,3
Heart e.ssential to (Jenius . '. 502
Manhood 593
Night-storm ! '. 503
Progress in Denial 501
Recompense 502
Solace of the Woo.ls ' ' 'ioi
Triumph 504
Unhappy Childhood 503
SMITH, ALEXANDER.
b. Kilmarnock, Scotland, Dec. .'il, If«l).
d. WarcJie, near Ldiiiburgli, Jan. 25, J,sii7.
Barbara (Horton) .-,04
Glasgow 505
SMITH, CHARLOTTE TURNER.
b. Sussex, Eng., 1740. d. ISOfi.
The Close of Spi-ing .^07
The Cricket .507
SAIITH, FLORENCE.
b. Xew York City. March 11, ]84^
d. Fort Washington, July 10, 1S71.
Somebody Older .509
The Purple of the Poet (Hain-
bow Songs) .508
The Yellow of the Miser (Rain-
bow Sont/s) .508
Uurequitiiig 509
SMITH, HORACE,
b. London, Dee. .31. 1770.
d. Tunbridge Wells, July 12, 1S40.
Address to a Mummy . . . . ."ill
Hymn to the Flowers .... 510
SMITH, MAY REILLY-.
b. Brighton, N. Y., 1S42.
If
Sometime
51.-!
51;;
SOUTHEY, CAROLINE ANTvE BOWLES,
b. Buckland, Eng., Dee. 6, 1787.
d. July 20, 1854.
I never Cast a Flower away . . 515
Launch thy Bark, Mariner . . 514
The Pauper's Death-bed . . . 514
SOUTHEY, ROBERT.
b. Bristol, Eng., Aug. 12. 1774.
d. Cumberland, Eng., March 21, 184.3.
Love's Immortality (Curse of
Keliaina) ..." 517
Nature's Questions and Faith's
Answer (Thataba) . 515
Night " . ,516
Remedial Suffering " . 5i(;
The Battle of Blenheim . . . .520
The Cataract of Lodore ... 521
The Ebb-tide .522
The Holly-Tree 5IS
The Maid of Orleans Girding for
Battle (Joan of Arc) .... 517
The . . . . 562
On the Reception of Wordsworth
atOxford 562
TANNAHILL, ROBERT.
b. Paisley, Scotland, June ."i, 1774.
d. Lancashire, Eng., May 17, 1810.
The Flower o' Dumblane . . . 563
The Midges Dance aboon the
Burn 563
TAYLOR, BAYARD.
b. Kennctt Square, Penn., Jan. II, 1J>2J.
d. Berlin, Dec. 19, 1S7S.
A Funeral Thought 565
Before the Bridal 566
In the Meadows 566
On the Headland .564
Proposal 565
Squandered Lives 566
The Father 564
The Lost May 56T
The Mystery 507
The Song of the Camp .... 568
To a Bavarian Uirl 569
Wind and Sea 565
TAYLOR, SIR HENRY,
b. Durham, Eng., 1800.
Love Reluctant to Endanger its
Object (Philip Van Artevelde) 570
Nature's Need '' " 571
Relaxation '" " 571
The Mystery of Life " " 570
Unknown Greatness " " 596
What Makes a Hero ? .... 571
When Joys are Keenest {PMlip
Van Arteviikh) 571
TAYLOR, JANE.
b. London, Sept. 23, 1783.
d. Ongar, Essexshire, April 2, 1824.
The Squire's Pew . , . . . .572
TENNYSON, ALFRED.
b. Sotnersby, Lincolnshire, Eng., 1809.
Ask me no More (The Princess) .'578
A Welcome to Alexandra . . . 582
Break, Break. Break .... 584
Bugle Song (jT/fe PWjice.ss) . . 577
Charge of the Light Brigade . 584
Circumstance 585
Come not when I am Dead . . 585
Condition of Spiritual Commu-
nion {In Memoriam) .... 574
Couplets from I.,oeksley Hall . 573
Cradle Song { 77(6 PriJice.f.s) . . 578
Faith in Doubt (In Memoriam) . 575
For his Child's Sake (The Prin-
cess) 577
Garden Song (Mand) .... 580
Go not, Happy Day (Maud) . . 581
Hope for All (In Memoriam) . . 571
Husband to Wife (The Miller's
DaiKihter) 579
Lady Clara ^'ere de Vere . . . 583
Love (Tlic Miller's Daughter) . 579
Man and Woman ( The Princess) 578
Move Eastward, Happv Earth . 585
Not at All, or All in AH (Merlin
and Virien) 580
Now Lies the Earth ( The Prin-
cess) 578
Reconciliation ( The Princess) . 577
Ring out, Wild Bells (In Memo-
riam) 576
Soul to Soul (/?!. il/e»?on'ffTO) . . 575
Strong Son of God {In Memwiam) 574
Tears, Idle Tears (The Priticess) 577
The Death of the Old Year . . 582
The Nuns' Song (Guinevere) . . 581
The Tears of Heaven .... 585
To a Friend in Heaven (In Me-
moriam) 576
"What I would be (The Miller's
Daughter) 579
THACKERAY, WILLIAM MAKEPEACE
b. Calcutta, E. I., 1811.
d. London, Dec. 24, ISfJS.
At the Church-gate 585
Little Billee 783
Sorrows of Werther . . . . , . 783
The Ballad of Bouillabaisse . 782
THAXTER, CELIA.
b. Portsmouth, N. IL, 1835.
A Mussel Shell 587
Beethoven 590
Courage 589
Discontent 586
Farewell 586
In the Kittery Churchyard . . 589
Love shall Save us All .... .588
Reverie •"i87
The Sandpiper •")91
The Sunrise never Failed us yet .587
To a Violin • . .588
THOMAS, EDITH M.
b. Litchfield, Ohio, 1854.
Flower and Fruit 853
THOMPSON, MAURICE.
b. Fairfield, Indiana, Sept. 9, 1844.
Before Dawn J<54
The ISIorning Hills 853
THOMSON, JAMES.
b. Ednam, Roxburghshire, Scotland, Sept. 11,
1700. d. New Lane, near Richmond, Eng.,
Aug. 27, 1748.
A State's Need of Virtue (Lib-
erty) •''^■^
Bird's, and their Loves CT/fc Sea-
sons) 59.3
Contentment 5J(
Death amid the Snows (The
Seasons) 593
Iviii
INDEX OF AUTHOR ti AND TITLES.
Excess to be Avoided ( The Cas-
tle of hulolence) 596
Harvest Time ( The Sensnns) . . 592
Health Necessary to Happy Life
( 'J'he Castle of Indolence) . . 597
Independence (Liberty) . . . 594
Nature's Joy Inalienable ( 77/e
Castle of Indolence) .... 596
Pure and' Happy Love {The Sea-
sons) 591
Kepose ( The Castle of Indolence) 595
Kule, Britannia . * 597
The Apollo, and Venus of Me bright world dies
With the dying sun.
The mind has a thousand eyes,
And the heart but one ;
Yet the light of a whole life dies
When its day is done.
LOVE'S REWARD.
Foi{ Love I labored all the day.
Through morning chill and midday
heat,
For surely with the evening gray,
I thought. Love's guerdon shall be
sweet.
At eventide, with weary limb,
1 brought my labors to the si)ot
BOWLES.
51
Where Love had bid me come to him ;
Thither I came, but found him not.
For he with idle folks had gone
To dance the hours of night away ;
And I that toiled was left alone,
Too weary now to dance or play.
THE DIFFERENCE.
Sweeter than voices in the scented
hay,
Or laughing children gleaning ears
that stray,
Or Christmas songs that shake the
snows above.
Is the first cuckoo, when he comes
with love.
Sadder than birds in simless sinnmer
eves.
Or drip of rain-drops on the fallen
leaves.
Or wail of wintry waves on frozen
shore.
Is spring that comes, but brings us
love no more.
William Lisle Bowles.
TO TIME.
Time ! who know'st a lenient hand
to lay
Softest on sorrow's wound, and
slowly thence —
Lulling to sad repose the weary
sense —
The faint pang stealest, unperceived
away ;
On thee I rest my only hope at last,
And think when thou hast dried
the bitter tear
That flows in vain o'er all my soul
held dear,
1 may look back on every sorrow past,
And meet life's peaceful evening with
a smile —
As some lone bird, at day's depart-
ing hour, [showei-,
Sings in the sunbeam of the transient
Forgetful, lliough its wings are wet
the while:
Yet, all ! how nuich must that poor
heart endure
AVhich hopes from thee, and thee
aloue, a cure!
THE GREENWOOD.
Oh! when 'tis summer weather.
And the yellow bee, with fairy
soimd.
The waters clear is humming round.
And the cuckoo sings unseen.
And the leaves are waving green, —
Oh! then 'tis sweet.
In some retreat,
To hear the murmuring dove,
With those whom on earth alone we
love.
And to wind through the greenwood
together.
But when 't is winter weather,
And crosses grieve,
And friends deceive,
And rain and sleet
The lattice beat, —
Oh ! then 't is sweet,
To sit and sing
Of the friends with whom, in the
days of Spring,
We roamed through the greenwood
together.
52
BRACKETT— BRAINARD.
Anna C. Brackett.
IN GAllFIELD'S DANGKll.
Is it not possible that all the love
From all these million hearts, which breathless turns
To one hushed room where silent footsteps move,
May have some power on life that feebly bui'ns '?
Must it not have some power in some strange way,
Some strange, wise way, beyond our tangled ken.
When far and Avide, from sea to sea to-day.
Even in quiet fiekls, hard-handed men
Pause in their toil to ask the passer-by
" What news ? " and then, " We cannot spare him yet! "
Surely no tide can powerless rise so high.
Bear on, brave heart! The land does not forget.
Thou yet shalt be upborne to life and strength again
On this flood-tide of love of millions of brave men.
Mary E. Bradley.
BE YOND RECALL.
There was a time when death and I
Met face to face together:
I was but young indeed to die,
And it was summer weather;
One happy year a wedded wife,
Yet I was slipping out of life.
You knelt beside me, and I heard,
As from some far-off distance,
A bitter cry that dimly stirred
My soul to make resistance.
You thought nie dead: you called
my name.
And back from Death itself I came.
But oh ! that you had made no sign,
That I had heard no crying !
For now the yearning voice is mine.
And there is no replying:
Death never coidd so cruel be
As Life — and you — have proved to
me!
John G. C. Brainard.
EPITHALAMliWr.
I SAW two clouds at morning.
Tinged by the rising sun, "
And in the dawn they floated on,
And mingled into one; [blest.
1 thought that morning cloud was
It moved so sweetly to the west.
I saw two summer currents
Flow smoothly to their meeting.
And join their course with silent force,
In peace each other greeting;
Calm was their course through banks
of green.
While dimpling eddies played be-
tween.
Such be your gentle motion.
Till life's last pulse shall beat;
Like summer's beam, and summer's
stream.
Float on, in joy, to meet
A calmer sea, where storms shall
cease —
A purer sky, where all is peace.
Mary Bolles Branch.
THE PETRIFIED FEUX.
In a valley, centuries ago,
Grew a little fern-leaf, green and
slender,
Veining delicate and fibres tender;
Waving when the wind crept down
so low ;
Rushes tall, and moss, and grass
grew round it.
Playful sunbeams darted in and
found it.
Drops of dew stole in by night,
and crowned it,
But no foot of man e'er trod that
way ;
Earth was young and keeping holi-
day.
Monster fishes swam the silent main,
Stately forests waved their giant
l^ranches.
Mountains hurled their snowy ava-
lanches.
Mammoth creatures stalked across
the plain ;
Nature revelled in grand mysteries;
But the little fern vvas not of these.
Did not number with the hills and
trees.
Only grew and waved its wild
sweet way.
No one came to note it day by day.
Earth, one time, put on a frolic
mood,
Heaved the locks and changed the
mighty motion
Of the deep, strong currents of the
ocean ;
Moved the plain and shook the
haughty wood.
Crushed" the little form in soft
moist clay.
Covered it. and hid it safe away,
O, the long, long centuries since
that day I
O, the agony, O, life's bitter cost,
Since tluit useless little fern was
lost !
Useless ! Lost ! There came a
thoughtful man
Searching Nature's secrets, far and
deep ;
From a fissure in a rocky steep
He withdrew a stone, o'er which
there ran
Fairy pencillings, a quaint design.
Veinings, leafage, fibres clear and
fine.
And the fern's life lay in every
line !
So. I think, God hides some souls
away,
Sweetly to surprise us the last day.
Anne Bronte.
IF THIS BE ALL.
O God! if this indeed l)e all
That life can show to me;
If on my aching brow may fall
No freshening dew from Thee; —
If with no brighter light than this
Tlie lamp of Hope may glow.
And I may only dream of bliss.
And wake to weary woe! —
If friendship's solace must decay
When other joys are gone.
And love must keep so far away.
While I go wandering on, —
Wandering" and toiling without gain,
The slave of others" will.
With constant care and frequent pain.
Desi)ised. forgotten still.
Grieving to look on vice and sin.
Yet powerless to quell
The silent current from within,
The outward torrent's swell;
While all the good 1 would impart
The feelings I would share.
54
BRONTk.
Are driven backward to my heart
And tui'ned to wormwood there; —
If clouds must ever keep from sight
The glories of the sun,
And I must suffer winter's blight
Ere summer is begun ; —
If life must be so full of care,
Then call vcn: soon to Thee!
Or give ine strength enough to bear
My load of misery.
Charlotte Bronte.
LIFE WILL BE GONE ERE I
HAVE LIVED.
Life will be gone ere I have lived;
Where now is life's first prime ?
I've worked and studied, longed and
grieved
Through all that busy time.
To toil, to think, to long, to grieve —
Is such my futui'e fate ?
The morn was dreary, must the eve
Be also desolate ?
Well, such a life at least makes Death
A welcome, wished-for friend;
Then aid me, Keason, Patience, Faith,
To suffer to the end.
Emily Bront^.
LAUT LINES.
No coward soul is mine.
No trembler in the world's storm-
troubled sphere:
I see heaven's glories shine.
And Faith shines equal, arming me
from fear.
O God within my breast.
Almighty, ever present Deity I
Life — that in me has rest,
As 1 — undying Life — have power
in thee I
Vain are the thousand creeds
That move men's hearts; unutterably
vain
Worthless as withered weeds.
Or idlest froth amid the boundless
main.
To waken doubt in one
Holding so fast by thine infinity;
So surely anchored on
The steadfast rock of immortality.
With wide-embracing love
Thy spirit animates eternal years,
Pervades and broods above.
Changes, sustains, dissolves, creates,
and rears.
Though earth and man were
gone.
And suns and universes ceased to be.
And Thou wert left alone.
Every existence would exist in Thee.
There is not room for Death,
Nor atom that his might could ren-
der void :
Thou — Thou art Being and
Breath,
Aud what Thou art may never be
destroyed.
deep
liEMEMDRANCE.
Cold in tlie earth — and the
snow piled above thee,
Far, far removed, cold in the dreary
grave! [thee.
Have I forgot, my only Love, to love
Severed at last by Time's all-severing
wave ?
BROOKS.
55
Now, when alone, do my thoughts
no longer hover
Over the mountains, on that north-
ern shore,
Resting their wings where heath and
fern-leaves cover
Thy noble heart for ever, ever more ?
Cold in the earth — and fifteen wild
Decembers,
From these brown hills, have melted
into spi'ing:
Faithful, indeed, is the spirit that
remembers [f ering !
After such years of change and suf-
Sweet Love of youth, forgive, if I
forget thee,
While the world's tide is bearing me
along;
Other desires and other hopes beset
me,
Hopes which obscure, but cannot do
thee wrong!
No later light has lightened up my
heaven,
No second morn has ever shone for
me;
All my life's bliss from thy dear life
was given, |thee
All my life's bliss is in the grave with
But, when the days of golden dreams
had perished,
And even Despair was powerless to
destroy ;
Then did I learn how existence could
be cherished,
Strengthened, and fed without the
aid of joy.
Then did I check the tears of useless
passion —
'^Veaned my young soul from yearn-
ing after thine;
Sternly denied its burning wish to
hasten |mine.
Down to that tomb already more than
And, even yet, I dare not let it lan-
guish.
Dare not indulge in memory's raptu-
rous pain ;
Once drinking deep of that divinest
anguish.
How could 1 seek the empty world
asiain ?
Maria Gowen Brooks.
[From Zophiel.]
SOXG OF EGLA.
Day, in melting purple dying;
Blossoms, all around me sighing;
Fragrance, from the lilies straying;
Zephyr, with my ringlets playing;
Ye but waken my distress;
I am sick of loneliness!
Thou, to whom I love to hearken.
Come, ere night around me darken ;
Though thy softness but deceive me.
Say thou'rt true, and I'll believe thee;
Veil, if ill, thy soul's intent.
Let me think it innocent!
Save thy toiling, spare thy treasuie;
All I ask is friendship's pleasure;
Let the shining ore lie darkling, —
Bring no gem in lustre sparkling;
Gifts and gold are naught to me,
I would only look on thee!
Tell to thee the high-wrought feeling.
Ecstasy, but in revealing;
Paint to thee the deep sensation.
Rapture in participation;
Yet l)ut torture, if comprest
Jn a lone, unfriended breast.
Absent still ! Ah ! come and bless me!
Let these eyes again caress thee.
Once in caution, I could fiy thee;
Now, 1 nothing could deny thee.
In a look \i death there be,
Come, and I will gaze on thee!
THE MARRIAGE OF DESPAIR.
The bard has sung, God never formed
a soul I meet
Without its own pecuHar mate, to
Its wandering half, when ripe to
crown the whole
Bright plan of bliss, most heavenly,
most complete!
But thousand evil things there are
that hate | impede,
To look on happiness: these hurt,
And, leagued with time, space, cir-
cumstance, and fate.
Keep kindred heart from heart, to
pine and pant and bleed.
And as the dove to far Palmyra
flying,
From where her native founts of
Antioch beam.
Weary, exhausted, longing, panting,
sighing.
Lights sadly at the desert's bitter
stream, —
So many a soul, o'er life's drear des-
ert faring,
Love's pure, congenial spring un-
found, unquaffed,
Suffers, recoils, — then, thirsty and
despairing
Of what it would, descends and sips
the nearest drauglit.
Frances Brown.
LOSSES.
Upon the white sea sand
There sat a pilgrim band.
Telling the losses that their lives had
known ;
While evening waned away
From breezy cliff and bay,
And the strong tide went out with
weary moan.
One spake, with quivering lip.
Of a fair freighted ship,
With all his household to the deep
gone down ;
But one had wilder woe —
For a fair face, long ago |town.
Lost in the darker depths of a great
There were who mourned their
youth
Witli a most loving ruth.
For its brave hopes and memories
ever green ;
And one upon the west
Turned an eye that would not
rest.
For far-off liills whereon its joy had
been.
Some talked of vanished gold,
Some of proud honors told,
Some spake of friends that were
tlieir trust no more;
And one of a green grave
Beside a foreign wave.
That made him sit so lonely on the
shore.
But when their tales were done,
Theie spake among them one,
A stranger, seeming from all sori'ow
free :
" Sad losses have ye met,
But mine is heavier yet ;
For a believing heart hath gone
fi'om me."
"Alas!" these pilgrims said,
" For the living and the dead —
For fortune's cruelty, for love's sure
cross,
For the wrecks of land and
sea!
But, howe'er it came to thee,
Thine, stranger, is life's last and
heaviest loss."
BROWN ELL.
57
Henry Howard Brownell.
THE RETURX OF A AXE.
Tom., tower and minster, toll
O'er the city's ebb and Howl
Roll, nniffled drum, still roll
AVith solemn beat and slow I —
A brave and a splendid soul
Hath gone — where all shall go.
Dimmei', in gloom and dark,
Waned the taper, day by day,
And a nation watched the spark,
Till its fluttering died away.
Was its flame so strong and cahn
Through the dismal years of ice
To die 'mid the orange and the palm
And the airs of Paradise ?
Over that simple bier
While the haughty Spaniard bows,
Grief may join in the geneious tear,
And Vengeance forget her vows.
Ay, honor the wasted form
That a noble spirit wore —
Lightly it presses on the warm
Spring sod of its parent shore;
Hunger and darkness, cold and storm
Never shall harm it moie.
No more of travel and toil.
Of tropic or arctic wild:
Gently, O Mother Soil,
Take thy worn and wearied child.
Lay him — the tender and true —
To rest with such who aie gone,
Each chief of the valiant crew
That died as oui- own hath done —
Let him rest with stout Sir Hugh,
Sir Humphrey, and good Sir John.
And let grief be far remote.
As we march from the place of
death.
To the blithest note of the fife's clear
throat.
And the bugle's cheeriest breath.
Roll, stirring drum, still roll!
Not a sigh — not a sound of woe.
That a grand and glorious soul
Hath gone where the brave must
go.
ALL TOO ETHER.
Old friends and dear! it were ungen-
tle rhyme.
If I should question of your true
hearts, whether [time.
Ye have forgotten that far, pleasant
The good old time when Ave were
all together.
Our limbs were lusty and our souls
sublime ;
We never heeded cold and winter
weather, |time.
Nor sun nor travel, in that cheery
The brave old time when we were
all together.
Pleasant it was to tread the mountain
thyme.
Sweet was the pure anil piny moim-
tain ether.
And pleasant all; but this was in the
time.
The good old time when Me were
all together.
Since then Pve strayed through many
a fitful clime,
■ (Tossed on the wind of fortune
like a feather,)
And chanced with rare good fellows
in my time —
But ne'er the time that we have
known together.
But none like those l)rave hearts (for
now 1 climj)
Gray hills alone, or thread the
lonely heather,)
That walked beside me in the ancient
twne.
The good old time when we were
all together.
58
BROWNE LL.
Long since, we parted in our careless
prime,
Like summer birds no June shall
hasten hither;
No more to meet as in that merry
lime,
The sweet spring-time that shone
on all together.
fSome, to the fevered city's toil and
grime.
And some o'er distant seas, and
some — ah ! whither ?
Nay, we shall never meet as in the
time.
The dear old time when we were
all together.
And some — above their heads, in
wind and rime.
Year after year, the grasses wave
and wither ;
Aye, we shall meet ! — 'tis but a little
time.
And all shall lie with folded hands
together.
And if, beyond the sphere of doubt
and crime.
Lie purer lands — ah ! let our steps
be thither;
That, done with earthly change and
earthly time,
In God's good time we may be all
together.
MIDNIGHT— A LAMENT.
Do the dead carry their cares
Like us, to the place of rest ?
The long, long night — is it theirs,
Weary to brain and breast ?
Ah, that I knew how it fares
With One that I loved the best.
I lie alone in the house.
How the wretched North-wind
raves !
I listen, and think of those
O'er whose heads the wet grass
waves —
Do they hear the wind that blows,
And the rain on their lonely graves ?
Heads that I helped to lay
On the pillow that lasts for aye.
It is but a little way
To the dreary hill where they lie-
No bed but the cold, cold clay —
No roof but the stormy sky.
Cruel the thought and vain I
They've now nothing more to bear-
Done with sickness and pain,
Done with trouble and care —
But I hear the wind and the rain.
And still 1 think of them there.
Ah, couldst thou come to me.
Bird that I loved the best 1
That I knew it was well with thee-
Wikl and weary North-WestI
Wail in chinniey and tree —
Leave the dead to their rest.
THE ADIEU.
Sweet Falsehoods, fare ye well I
That may not longer dwell
In this fond iieart, dear paramours of
Youth!
A cold, unloving bride
Is ever at my side —
Yet who so pure, so beautiful as
Truth ?
Long hath she sought my side.
And would not be denie(l.
Till, all perforce, she won my spirit
o'er —
And though her glances be
But hard and stern to me,
At every step 1 love her more and
more.
ALONE.
A SAD old house by the sea.
Were we happy. I and thou.
In the days that used to be ?
There is nothing left me now
But to lie, and think of thee
With folded hands on my breast,
And lisl to the weary sea
.Sobbing itself to rest.
BROWNE LL.
59
LOXG AGO.
When at eve I sit alone.
Thinking on the Past and Gone —
Wliiie the clock, with drowsy finger,
Marks how long the minutes lin-
ger, —
And the embers, dimly burning.
Tell of Life to Uust returning —
Then my lonely chair around,
AVith a (juiet. mournful sound,
With a murmur soft and low,
Come the ghosts of Long Ago.
One by one, I count them o'er.
Voices, that are heard no more,
Tears, that loving cheeks have wet,
Words, whose music lingers yet, —
Holy faces, pale and fair.
.Shadowy locks of waving hair —
Happy sighs and whispers dear,
Songs forgotten many a year, —
Lips of dewy fragrance — eyes
Brighter, bluer than the skies —
Odors breathed from Paradise.
And the gentle sliadows glide
Softly murmuring at my side.
Till the long unfriendly day.
All forgotten, fades away.
Thus, when I am all alone.
Dreaming o'er the Past and Gone,
All around me, 'sad and slow.
Come the ghosts of Long Ago.
Midnight in drear New England,
'Tis a driving storm of snow —
How the casement clicks and rattles.
And the wind keeps on to blow !
For a thousand leagues of coast-line.
In fitful flurries and starts.
The wild North-Easter is knocking
At lonely windows and hearts.
Of a night like this, how many
Must sit by the hearth, like me.
Hearing the stormy weather.
And thinkins: of those at sea!
Of the hearts chilled through with
watching,
The eyes that wearily blink.
Through the blinding gale and snow-
drift,
For the Lights of NavesinkI
How fares it, my friend, with you '? —
If I've kept your reckoning aright,
The brave old ship must be due
On our dreary coast, to-night.
The fireside fades before me.
The chamber quiet and warm —
And I see the gleam of her lanterns
In the wild Atlantic storm.
Like a dream, 'tis all around me —
The gale, with its steady boom,
And the crest of every roller
Torn into mist and spume —
The sights and the sounds of Ocean
On a night of peril and gloom.
The shroud of snow and of spoon-
drift
Driving like mad a-lee —
And the iiuge black hulk that wallows
Deep in the trough of the sea.
The creak of cabin and bulkhead.
The wail of rigging and mast —
The roar of the shrouds as she rises
From a deep lee-roll to the blast.
The sullen throb of the engine.
Whose iron heart never tires —
The swarthy faces that I'edden
By the glare of his caverned fires.
The binnacle slowly swaying.
And nursing the faithful steel —
And the grizzled old quarter-master,
His horny hands on the wheel.
I can see it — the little cabin —
Plainly as if 1 were there —
The chart on the old green table.
The book and the empty chair.
On the deck we have trod together,
A patient and manly form.
To and fro, by the foremast.
Is pacing in sleet and storm.
60
BROWN INC.
Since her keel first struck cold water,
By the Stormy Cape's clear Light,
'Tis little of sleep or slumber.
Hath closed o'er that watchful sight,
And a hundred lives are hanging
On eye and on heart to-night.
Would that to-night, beside him,
I walked the watch on her deck,
Recalling the Legends of Ocean,
Of ancient battle and wreck.
But the stout old craft is rolling
A hundred leagues a-lee —
Fifty of snow-wreathed hill-side,
And fifty of foaming sea.
I cannot hail him, nor press him
By the hearty and true i-ight
hand —
1 can but miumur, — God bless
him ! .
And bring him safe to the land.
And send him the best of weather.
That ere many sims shall shine,
We may sit by the hearth together.
And talk about Auld Lang Syne.
WA/TfXG FOR THE SIIW.
[Bv C. D'AV. B.]
We are ever waiting, waiting,
Waiting for the tide to turn —
" For the train at Coventry,"
For the sluggish fire to burn —
For a far-off friend's return.
We are ever hoping, hoping.
Hoping that the wind will shift —
That success may crown our venture-
That the morning fog may lift —
That the dying may have shrift.
We are ever fearing, fearing.
Fearing lest the ship have sailed —
That the sick may ne'er recover —
That the letter was not mailed —
That the tiusted firm has failed.
We are ever wishing, wishing.
Wishing we were far at sea —
That the winter were l)ut over —
That we could but find the key —
That the prisoner were free.
Wishing, fearing, hoping,, waiting.
Through life's voyage — moored at
last,
Tedious doubts shall merge forever
(Be their sources strait or vast,)
In the inevitable Past.
Elizabeth Barrett Browning.
THE SLEEP.
He givetb His beloved sleep.
Pnalm cxxvii. 2.
Of all the thoughts of God that are
Borne inward unto souls afar.
Along the Psalmist's music deep.
Now tell me if that any is.
For gift or grace, siu-passing this —
" He givetliHis beloved sleep? "
What would we give to our beloved ?
The hero's heart, to be unmoved,
The poet's star-tuned liarp, to sweep.
The patriot's voice, to teach and
rouse,
The monarch's crown, to light the
bi'ows ? —
" He givetb i7/.s- beloved sleep."
What do we give to our beloved ?
A little faith all undisproved,
A little dust to overweep
And bitter memories to make
The whole earth blasted for our sake.
" He givetb Ilia beloved sleep."
BROWNING.
61
"Sleep soft, beloved! " we sometimes
say
But have no tune to charm away
Sad dreams that through the eyelids
creep :
But never doleful dreams again
Shall break the happy slumber when
"He givetli IIl» beloved sleep."
O earth, so full of dreary noises!
O men, with wailing in your voices!
O delved gold, the wallers heap!
strife, O curse, that o'er it fall!
God strikes a silence through you all,
And "giveth His beloved sleep."
His dews drop nuitely on the hill.
His cloud above it saileth still,
Though on its slope men sow and reap.
More softly than the dew is shed.
Or cloud is floated overhead,
" He giveth His beloved sleep."
Ay, men may wonder while they scan
A living, thinking, feeling man.
Confirmed in such a rest to keep;
But angels say, and through the word
1 think their happy smile is heard —
" He giveth His beloved sleep."
For me, my heart that erst did go
Most like a tired child at a show,
That sees through tears the mummers
leap.
Would now its wearied vision close.
Would childlike on His love repose,
Who "giveth His beloved sleep."
And friends, dear friends — when it
shall be
That this low breath is gone from me.
And round my bier ye come to weep.
Let one, most loving of you all.
Say, " Not a tear must o'er her fall —
' He giveth His beloved sleep.' "
LITTLE MATTIE.
Dead ? Thirteen a month ago !
Short and narrow her life's walk.
Lover's love she could not know
Even by a dream or talk:
Too young to be glad of youth ;
Missing honor, labor, rest,
And the warmth of a babe's mouth
At the blossom of her breast.
Must you pity her for this.
And for all the loss it is —
You, her mother, with wet face,
Having had all in your case ?
Just so young but yesternight,
Now she is as old as death.
Meek, obedient in your sight,
Gentle to a beck or breath
Only on last Monday ! yours.
Answering you like silver bells
Slightly touched ! an hour matures :
You can teach her nothing else.
She has seen the mystery hid
Under Egypt's pyramid:
By those eyelids pale and close
Now she knows what Rhamses knows.
Cross her quiet hands, and smooth
Down her patient locks of silk,
Cold and passive as in truth
You your fingers in spilt milk
Drew along a marble floor;
But her lips you cannot wring
Into saying a word more,
" Yes," or " No," or such a thing.
Though you call, and beg, and wreak
Half your soul out in a shriek.
She will lie there in default
And most innocent revolt.
Ay, and if she spoke, may be
She would answer like the Sox,
" What is now 'twixt thee and me ? "
Dreadful answer! better none.
Yours on Monday, God's to-day!
Yours, your child, your blood, your
heart.
Called ... you called her, did you
say,
" Little Mattie," for your part ?
Now already it sounds strange.
And you wonder, in this change.
What He calls His angel-creature,
Higher up than you can reach her.
'Twas a green and easy world
As she took it! room to play,
(Though one's hair might get uncurled
At the far end of the day. )
62
BROWNING.
What she suffered she shook off
In the sunshine; what she sinned
She could pray on high enough
To keep safe above the wind.
If reproved by God or you,
'Twas to better her she knew;
And if crossed, slie gatliered still.
'Twas to cross out something ill.
You, you had the right, you thought,
To survey her with sweet scorn,
Poor gay child, who had not caught
Yet the octave-stretch forlorn
Of your larger wisdom ! Nay,
Now your places are changed so.
In that same superior way
She regards you dull and low
As you did herself exempt
From life's sorrows. Grand con-
tempt
Of the spir'its risen awhile.
Who look back with such a smile!
There's the sting of 't. That, I think.
Hurts the most, a thousand-fold !
To feel sudden, at a wink.
Some dear child we used to scold.
Praise, love both ways, kiss and tease.
Teach and txunble as our own.
All its curls about our knees.
Rise up suddenly full-grown.
Who could wonder such a sight
Made a woman mad outright ?
Show me Michael with the sword,
Kather than such angels. Lord !
TO FLUSH, MY DOG.
Like a lady's ringlets brown,
Flow thy silken ears adown
Either side demurely
Of thy silver-suited breast
Shining out from all the rest
Of thy body purely.
Darkly brown thy body is.
Till the sunshine striking this
Alchemize its dullness:
When the sleek curls manifold
Flash all over into gold.
With a burnished fulness.
LTnderneath my stroking hand,
Startled eyes of hazel bland
Kindling, growing larger.
Up thou leapest with a spring,
Fvdl of prank and curveting.
Leaping like a charger.
Leap! thy broad tail waves alight;
Leap ! thy slender feet are bright,
Canopied in fringes.
Leap — those tasselled ears of thine.
Flicker strangely, fair and fine,
Down their golden inches.
Yet, my pretty, sportive friend,
Little is 't to such an end
That I praise thy rareness!
Other dogs may be thy peers
Haply in those drooping ears,
And this glossy fairness.
liut of thee it shall be said.
This dog watched beside a bed
Day and night unweary, —
Watched within a curtained room,
Where no sunbeam brake the gloom
Round the sick and dreary.
Iioses gathered for a vase.
In tliat chamber died apace,
Beam and breeze resigning —
This dog only waited on.
Knowing that, when light is gone
Love remains for shining.
father dogs in thymy dew
Tiacked the hares and followed
through
Sunny moor or meadow —
This dog only crept and crept
Next to languid cheek that slept,
Sharing in the shadow.
Other dogs of loyal cheer
Bounded at the whistle clear,
Up the woodside hieing —
This dog only, watched in reach,
Of a faintly uttered speech,
Or a louder sighing.
And if one or two quick tears
Dropped upon his glossy ears,
Or a sigh came double, —
Up he sprang in eager haste,
Fawning, fondling, l^eathing fast,
In a lender ti'ouble.
Therefore to this dog will I,
Tenderly, not scornt'idly.
Render praise and favor :
With my hand upon his head.
Is my benediction said,
Thei-efore and forever.
And beeanse he loves me so,
Better than his kind will do
Often, man, or woman,
(live I back more love again
Than dogs often take of men,
Leaning from my Human.
CONSOLATION.
All are not taken ! there are left be-
hind
Living Beloveds, tender looks to
bring,
And make the daylight still a happy
thing.
And tender voices to make soft the
wind.
But if it were not so — if 1 could find
No love in all the world for comfort-
ing.
Nor any path but hollowly did ring,
Where " dust to dust" the love from
life disjoined —
And if before these sepulchres im-
nioving
I stood alone, (as some forsaken lamb
Goes bleating up the moors in wearv
dearth)
Cryiiig "'Where are ye, O my loved
and loving?"
1 know a voice would sound,
"Daughter. I am.
Can I suttice for Heaven, and not
for earth ? ' '
A PORTRAIT.
'• One name is Elizabeth." — Ben Jonsox.
I WILL paint her as I see her;
Ten times have the lilies blown
Since she looked upon the sun.
And her face is lily-clear —
Lily-shaped, and drooped in duty.
To the law of its own beauty.
Oval cheeks encolored faintly,
Which a trail of golden hair
Keeps from fading off to air:
And a forehead fair and saintly,
Which two blue eyes undershine.
Like meek prayers before a shrine.
Face and figure of a child, —
Though too calm, you think, and
tender.
For the childhood you would lend
her.
Yet child-simple, imdefiled,
Frank, obedient, — waiting still
On the turnings of your will.
Moving light, as all young things —
As young birds, or early wheat
When the wind blows over it.
Only free from flutterings
Of loud mirth that scorneth meas-
ure —
Taking love for her chief pleasure:
Choosing pleasures (for the rest)
Which come softly — just as .s^e.
When she nestles at your knee.
Quiet talk she liketh best.
In a bower of gentle looks —
Watering flowers, or reading
books.
And if any poet knew lier.
He would sing of her with falls
Used in lovely madrigals.
And if any painter drew her,
He would paint her unaware
With a halo round her hair.
And a stranger, — when he sees
her
In the street even — smileth stilly.
Just as you would at a lily.
64
BROWNING.
And all voices that address her.
Soften, sleeken every word,
As if speaking to a bird.
And all fancies yearn to cover
The hard earth whereon she passes,
With the thymy-scented grasses.
And all hearts do pray, "God love
her!"
Ay, and always, in good sooth,
We may all be sure He doth.
[Sonnets from the Portuguese.]
ASSUHAXCE.
Say over again and yet once over
again
That thou dost love nie. Though the
word repeated
Should seem "a cuckoo-song," as
thou dost treat it.
Remember never to the hill or plain.
Valley and wood, without her cuckoo-
strain,
Comes the fresh Spring in all her
green completed !
Beloved, I amid the darkness greeted
By a doubtful spirit-voice, in that
doubt's pain
Cry . . speak once more . . thou lov-
est ! Who can fear
Too many stars, though each in
heaven shall roll —
Too many flowers, though each shall
crown the year ?
Say thou dost love me, love me, love
me — toll
The silver iterance I — only minding,
dear.
To love me also in silence, with thy
soul.
PERFECT LOVE.
How do I love thee ? Let me count
the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth
and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out
of sight
For the ends of being and ideal grace.
I love thee to the level of every-
day' s
Most quiet need, by sun and candle-
light.
I love thee freely, as men strive for
Right:
I love thee purely, as they turn from
Praise :
I love thee with the passion put to
use
In my old griefs, and with my child-
hood's faith;
I love thee with a love I seemed to
lose
With my lost saints, — I love thee
with the breath.
Smiles, tears, of all my life! — and, if
God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.
THREE KISSES.
First time he kissed me, he but only
kissed
The fingers of this hand wherewith I
write.
And ever since it grew more clean
and white,
Slow to world-greetings . . quick with
its "Oli; list !"
When the angels speak. A ring of
amethyst
1 could not wear here plainer to my
sight.
Than that first kiss. The second
passed in height
The first, and sought the forehead,
and half missed.
Half falling on the hair. Oh, beyond
meed I
That was the chrism of love, M-hich
love's own crown.
With sanctifying sweetness, did pre-
cede.
The third upon my lips was folded
down
In perfect, purple state ! since when,
indeed,
I have been proud and said, " My
love, my own."
THE CRY OF THE Hi' MAX.
■' There is no God, ' the foolish
saith,
But none, '' Tliere is no sorrow; "
And nature oft, the cry of faith,
In bitter need will borrow:
Eyes which the preacher could not
school.
By wayside graves are raised ;
And lips say, " God be pitiful,"
That ne'er said, " God be praised."
Be pitiful, O God!
We sit together with the skies,
The steadfast skies, above us :
We look into each other's eyes,
"And how long will youlove us?"
The eyes grow dim with prophecy.
The voices low and breathless —
"Till death us part! " — O words to
be
Our beat for love, the deathless !
Be pitiful, dear God!
We tremble by the harmless bed
Of one loved and departed —
Our tears drop on the lips that said
Last night, " Be stronger hearted ! "
O God, — to clasp those fingers close,
And yet to feel so lonely ! —
To see a light upon such brows,
Which is the daylight only !
Be pitiful, O God!
We sit on hills our childhood wist,
Woods, hamlets, streams, behold-
ing;
The sun strikes through the farthest
mist.
The city's spire to golden.
The city's golden spire it was,
When hope and health were strong-
est.
But now it is the churchyard grass
We look upon the longest.
Be pitiful, O God !
And soon all vision waxeth dull —
Men whisper, " He is dying! "
We cry no more, " Be pitiful! " —
We have no strength for crying;
No strength, no need! Then, soul of
mine.
Look up and triumph I'ather —
Lo! in the depth of God's Divine,
The Son abjures the Father —
Be pitiful, O God!
OXLY A CURL.
Friends of faces unknown and a
land
Unvisited over the sea.
Who tell me how lonely you stand.
With a single gold curl in the hand
Held up to be looked at by me !
While you ask me to ponder and say
What a father and mother can do.
With the bright yellow locks put
away
Out of reach, beyond kiss, in the clay.
Where the violets press nearer than
you: —
Shall I speak like a poet, or run
Into weak woman's tears for re-
lief ?
Oh, children! I never lost one.
But my arm's round my own little
son.
And Love knows the secret of
Grief.
And I feel what it must be and is
When God draws a new angel so
Through the house of a man up to
His,
With a miu'mur of music you miss.
And a rapture of light you forego.
How you think, staring on at the
door
Where the face of your angel
flashed in.
That its brightness, familiar before.
Burns off from you ever the more
For the dark of your sorrow and sin.
" God lent him and takes him," you
sigh . . .
— Nay, there let me break with
your pain,
God's generous in giving, say I,
And the thing which he gives, I deny
That he can ever take back again.
l4%
66
BROWNING.
He gives what He gives. I appeal
To all who bear babes ! In the hour
When the veil of the body we feel
Kent round us, while torments reveal
The motherhood's advent in power;
And the babe cries, — have all of us
known
By apocalypse (God being there.
Full in nature !) the child is our own —
Life of life, love of love, moan of
moan,
Through all changes, all times,
everywhere.
He's ours and forever. Believe,
O father ! — O mother, look back
To the first love's assurance! To give
Means, with God, not to tempt or
deceive
With a cup thrtist in Benjamin's
sack.
He gives what He gives : be content.
He resumes nothing given — be sure.
God lend ? — ^here the usurers lent
In His temple, indignant he went
And scourged away all those im-
pure.
He lends not, but gives to the end,
As He loves to the end. If it seem
That he draws back a gift, compre-
hend
'Tisto add to it rather . . . amend,
And finish it up to your dream, —
Or keep ... as a mother may, toys
Too costly though given by herself,
Till the room shall be stiller from
noise.
And the children more fit for such
joys,
Kept over their heads on the shelf.
So look up, friends ! You who indeed
Have possessed in your house a
sweet piece
Of the heaven which men strive for,
must need
Be more earnest than others are,
speed
Where they loiter, persist where
they cease.
You know how one angel smiles there.
Then courage! 'Tis easy for you
To be drawn by a single gold hair
Of that curl, from earth's storm and
despair
To the safe place above us. Adieu!
[From Aurora Leigh.]
KIXnXESS Fin ST K\0)VK IN A
HOSPITAL.
. . . . The place seemed new and
strange as death.
The white strait bed, with others
strait and white.
Like graves dug side by side, at meas-
ured lengths,
And quiet people walking in and out
With wonderful low voices and soft
steps.
And apparitional equal care for each,
Astonished her with order, silence,
law: [cup,
And when a gentle hand held out a
She took it, as you do at sacrament.
Half awed, half melted, — not being
used, indeed.
To so much love as makes the form
of love
And courtesy of manners. Delicate
drinks
And rare white bread, to whicli some
dying eyes [God,
Were tm-ned in observation. O my
How sick we must be, ere we make
men just !
I think it frets the saints in heaven
to see
How many desolate creatures on the
earth
Have learnt the simple dues of fellow-
ship
Ancl social comfort, in a hospital.
[From Aurora Leigh.']
SELFISHNESS OF INTROSPEC-
TION.
We are wrong always, when we think
too much
Of what we think or are; albeit our
thoughts
MARIAN ERLE,
Page 67.
BROWNING.
(J7
Be verily bitter as self-sacrifice,
We are no less selfish ! If we sleep
on rocks
Or roses, sleeping past the hour of
noon.
We're lazy.
[From Aurora Leigh.]
A CHARACTER.
As light November snows to empty
nests,
As grass to graves, as moss to mil-
dewed stones.
As July suns to ruins, through the
• rents,
As ministering spirits to mourners,
through a loss.
As Heaven itself to men, through
pangs of death
He came uncalled wherever grief had
come.
[From Aurora Leigh.]
PICTURE OF MARIA^r ERLE.
She was not w^hite nor brown
But could look either, like a mist that
changed
According to being shone on more or
less.
The liair, too. ran its opulence of
curls
In doubt "twixt dark and bright, nor
left you clear
To name the color. Too mucli hair
perhaps
(I'll name a fault liere) for so small a
liead,
Whicli seemed to droop on that side
and on tliis.
As a full-blown rose, uneasy with its
weight.
Though not a breatli should trouble
it. Again,
The dimple in the cheek had better
gone
Witli redder, fuller roimds: and some-
wliat large
The mouth was^ though tlie milky
little teeth
Dissolved it to so infantine a smile!
For soon it smiled at me; the eyes
smiled too,
But 'twas as if remembering tliey liad
wejjt.
And knowing they should, some day,
Aveep again.
[From Aurora Leigh.]
THE OXE UNIVERSAL SYMPATHY.
. . . . O woni.D,
O jurists, rhymers, dreamers, what
you please.
We play a weary game of hide and
seek!
We sliape a figure of our fantasy.
Call nothing something, and run af-
ter it
And lose it, lose ourselves, too, in tlie
search.
Till clash against us, comes a some-
body
Who also has lost sometliing and is
lost
[From Aurora Leigh,]
IN STRUGGLE.
Alas, long suffering and most patient
God,
Tliou need'st be surelier God to bear
with us
Than even to have made us ! tliou as-
pire, aspire
From henceforth for me! tliou who
hast, thyself,
Endured tliis fleslihood, knowing
liow, as a soaked
And sucking vesture, it would drag
us down
And choke us in the melancholy
deep.
Sustain me, tliat, with tliee, I walk
these waves.
Resisting ! — breatlie me upward, thou
for me
Aspiring, who art tlie Way, tlie
Truth, the Life, —
That no truth lienceforth seem indif-
ferent.
No way to truth laborious, and no life,
Not even this life I live, intolerable !
i
68
BROWNING.
Robert Browning.
pnospiCE.
Fe.vk death? — to feel the fog in my
throat,
The mist in my face,
When the snows begin, and the blasts
denote
1 am nearing the place,
The power of the night, the press of
the storm,
The post of the foe ;
Where he stands, the Arch-Fear in a
visible form.
Yet the strong man must go ;
Now the journey is done and the svnn-
mit attained.
And the barriers fall.
Though a battle "s to fight ere the
guerdon be gained,
The reward of it all.
1 was ever a fighter, so, — one tight
more,
The best and the last !
1 would hate that Death bandaged
my eyes, and forbore.
And bade me creep past.
No ! let me taste the whole of it, fare
like my peers.
The heroes of old.
Bear the brunt, in a minute pay glad
life's arrears.
Of pain, darkness and cold.
For sudden the worst turns the best
to the brave.
The black minute's at end.
And the elements' rage, the fiend-
voices that rave.
Shall dwindle, shall blend.
Shall change, shall become first a
]3eace, then a joy.
Then a light, then thy breast,
O soul of my soul ! I shall clasp thee
again.
And with God be the rest!
IX A YEAH.
Nevkr any more
While I live,
Need I hope to see his face
As before.
Once his love grown chill.
Mine may strive, —
Bitterly we re-embrace,
Single still.
Was it something said,
Something done.
Vexed him ? was it touch of hand.
Turn of head ?
Strange ! that very way
Love begun.
I as little understand
Love's decay.
AYhen I sewed or drew,
1 recall
How he looked as if I sang
— Sweetly too.
If I spoke a word,
First of all
Up his cheek the color sprang,
Then he heard.
Sitting by my side,
At my feet,
So he breathed the air I breathed
Satisfied !
I too, at love's brim
Touched the sweet :
I would die if death bequeathed
Sweet to him.
" Speak, — I love thee best ! "
He exclaimed.
" Let thy love my own foretell,"—
1 confessed:
" Cast my heart on thine
Now unblamed.
Since upon thy soul as well
Hangeth mine!"
Was it wrong to own,
Being truth ?
Why should all the giving prove
His alone ?
I had wealth and ease.
Beauty, youth, —
Since my lover gave me love,
I gave these.
That was all 1 meant,
— To be just,
And the passion 1 had raised
To content.
Since he chose to change
Gold for dust,
If I gave him what he praised,
AVas it strange '?
Would he love me yet,
On and on,
While 1 found some way imdreamed,
— Paid my debt !
Give more life and more,
Till, all gone,
He should smile, *' She never seemed
Mine before.
" AVhat — she felt the while,
Must I think ?
Love's so different with us men,"
He should smile.
" Dying for my sake —
White and pink!
Can't we touch those bubbles then
But they break ? ' '
Dear, the pang is brief.
Do thy part,
Have thy pleasure. How perplext
Grows belief!
AVell, this cold clay clod
Was man's heart.
Crumble it, — and what comes next ?
Is it God ?
EVELYN HOPE.
Beautiful Evelyn Hope is dead !
Sit and watch by her side an hour.
That is her book-shelf, this her bed ;
She plucked that piece of gera-
nium-flower.
Beginning to die too, in the glass.
Little has yet been changed, I
think.
The shutters are shut, — no light may
pass
Save two long rays through the
hinge's chink.
Sixteen years old when she died !
Perhaps she had scarcely heard my
name, —
It was not her time to love; beside.
Her life had many a hope and aim.
Duties enough and little cares;
And now was quiet, now astir, —
Till God's hand beckoned unawares.
And the sweet white brow is all of
her.
Is it too late, then, Evelyn Hope ?
What ! your soul was pure and true ;
The good stars met in your horoscope,
Made you of spirit, fire, and dew;
And just because I was thrice as old.
And our paths in the world diverged
so wide,
Each was naught to each, must I be
told •?
We were fellow-mortals, — naught
beside ?
Xo, indeed ! for God above
Is great to grant as mighty to make.
And creates the love to reward the
love ;
I claim you still, for my own love's
sake!
Delayed, it may be, for more lives
yet.
Through worlds I shall traverse,
not a few ;
Much is to learn and much to forget
Ere the time be come for taking
you.
But the time will come — at last it
will —
When, Evelyn Hope, what meant.
I shall say.
In the lower earth, — in the years
long still, —
That body and soul so pure and
gay'?
Why your hair was amber I shall
divine.
And your mouth of your own gera-
nium's red, —
And what you would do with me, in
fine.
In the new life come in the old one's
stead.
BROWNING.
1 have lived, shall I say, so much since
then,
Given up myself so many times,
(iained me the gains of various
men,
Ransacked the ages, spoiled the
climes ;
Yet one thing — one — in my soul's
full scope.
Either I missed, or itself missed
me, —
And I want and find you, Evelyn
Hope!
What is the issue '? let us see !
1 loved you, Evelyn, all the while;
My heart seemed full as it could
hold, —
There was space and to spare for the
frank young smile.
And the red young mouth, and the
hair's young gokl.
So, hush! I will give you this leaf to
keep :
See, I shut it inside the sweet, cold
hand.
There, that is our secret ! go to sleep :
You will wake, and remember, and
understand.
[From In a Gondola.]
THE TWO KISSES.
The Moth's kiss, first!
Kiss me as if you made believe
You were not sure, this eve.
How my face, yoiu' fio\\er, had
pursed
Its petals up ; so, here and there
You brush it, till I grow aware
Who wants me, and wide open burst.
The Bee's kiss, now!
Kiss me as if you entered gay
My heart at some noonday,
A bud that dared not disallow
The claim, so all is rendered up,
And passively its shattered cup
Over your head to sleep I bow.
HOW THEY BROUGHT THE GOOD
NEWS FROM GHENT TO .4/X.
I SPRANG to the Stirrup, and Joris
and he:
I galloped, Dirck galloped, we gal-
loped all three ;
"Good speed!" cried the watch as
the gate-bolts undrew,
" Speed!" echoed the wall to us gal-
loping through.
Behind shut the postern, the lights
sank to rest.
And into the midnight we galloped
abreast.
Xot a word to each other; we kept
the great pace —
Xeck by neck, stride by stride, never
changing our place ;
I turned in my saddle and made its
girths tight.
Then shortened each stirrup and set
the pique right,
Rebuckled the check-strap, chained
slacker the bit,
Xor galloped less steadily Roland a
whit.
'Twas moonset at starting; butAvhile
we drew near
Lokeren. the cocks crew and twilight
dawned clear ;
At Boom a great yellow star came
out to see ;
At Duffeld 'twas morning as plain as
could be;
And from Mecheln church-steeple we
heard the half-chime —
So Joris broke silence with " Yet
there is time! "
At Aerscliot up leaped of a sudden
the sun.
And against him the cattle stood
black every one,
To stare through the mist at us gal-
loping past;
And I saw my stout galloper Roland
at last.
With resolute shoulders, each butting
away
The haze, as some bluff river head-
land its spray;
BROWNING.
71
And his low head and crest, just one
sharp ear bent back
For my voice, and the other x^ricked
out on his track ;
And one eye's black intelligence, —
ever that glance
O'er its white edge at me, his own
master, askance;
And the thick heavy spume-flakes,
which aye and anon
His fierce lips shook upward in gal-
loping on.
By Hasselt, Dirck groaned; and cried
Joris, "Stay spur!
Your Roos galloped bravely, the
fault's not in her;
We'll remember at Aix" — for one
heard the quick wheeze
Of her chest, saw the stretched neck,
and staggering knees.
And sunk tail, "and horl-ible heave of
the flank,
As down on her haunches she shud-
dered and sank.
So we were left galloping, Joris and I.
Past Looz and past Tongres, no cloud
in the sky;
The broad sun above laughed a piti-
less laugh ;
'Neath our feet broke the brittle,
bright stubble like chaff;
Till over by Delhem a dome-spire
sprang white.
And "Gallop," gasped Joris, "for
Aix is in sight! "
" How they'll greet us ! " — and all in
a moment his roan
Rolled neck and croup over, lay dead
as a stone ;
And there was my Roland to bear
the whole weight
Of the news which alone could save
Aix from her fate.
With his nostrils like pits full of
blood to the brim.
And with circles of red for his eye-
sockets' rim.
Then I cast loose my buff-coat, each
holster let fall.
Shook oft' both my jack-boots, let go
belt and all.
Stood up in the stirrup, leaned, pat-
ted his ear,
Called my Roland his pet-name, my
horse without peer —
Clapped my hands, laughed and sung,
any noise, bad or good,
Till at length into Aix, Roland gal-
loped and stood.
And all I remember is friends flock-
ing round.
As I sate with his head 'twixt my
knees on the ground ;
And no voice but was praising this
Roland of mine,
As I poured down his throat our last
measure of wine.
Which (the burgesses voted by com-
mon consent)
Was no more than his due who
brought good news from Ghent.
IFrom The Ring and The Book:]
DREAMS.
It is the good of dreams — so soon
they go !
Wake in a horror of heart-beats you
may —
Ciy, " The dead thing will never
from my thoughts!"
Still, a few daylight doses of plain
life.
Cock-crow and sparrow-chirp, or
bleat and bell
Of goats that trot by, tinkling to be
milked;
And when you rub your eyes awake
and wide.
Where is the harm o' the horror?
Gone !
[From The Riii;/ and The Rook.]
THE LACK OF CHILDREX.
What could they be but happy? —
balanced so,
Xor low i' the social scale nor yet too
high.
Xor poor nor richer than comports
with ease.
BRYANT.
Nor bright and envied, nor obscure
and scorned,
Nor so young that their pleasures fell
too thick.
Nor old past catching pleasiu'e Mheii
it fell,
Nothing above, below the just degree,
All at the mean where joy's compo-
nents mix.
So again, in the couple's very souls
You saw the adequate half with half
to match,
Each having and each lacking some-
what, both
Making a whole that had all and
lacked naught;
The round and sound, in whose com-
posure just
The acquiescent and recipient side
"Was Pietro's, and the stirring striv-
ing one
Yiolante's: both in union gave the
due
Quietude, enterprise, craving and
content.
Which go to bodily health and peace
of mind.
But, as 'tis said a body, rightly
mixed.
Each element in equipoise, would
last
Too long and live forever, — accord-
ingly
Holds a germ — sand-grain weight too
much i' the scale —
Ordained to get predominance one
ilay
And so bring all to ruin and release, —
Not otherwise a fatal germ lurked
here:
"With mortals much must go, but
something stays;
Nothing will stay of our so happy
selves."
Out of the very ripeness of life's
core
A worm was bred — "Our life shall
leave no fruit."
Enough of l)liss, they thought, could
bliss bear seed,
yield its like, propagate a bliss in
turn
And keep the kind up; not supplant
themselves
But put in evidence, record they
were,
Show them, when done with, i' the
shape of a child.
" 'Tis in a child, man and wife grow
complete.
One flesh: God says so: let him do
his work! "
William Cullen Bryant.
''BLESSED ARE THEY
MOUHN. "
THA T
Oil, deem not they are blest alone
Whose lives a peaceful tenor keep ;
The Power who pitii's man has
shown
A blessing for the eyes that weep.
The light of smiles shall fill again
The lids that overflow with tears;
And weary hours of woe and pain
Are promises of happier years.
There is a day of simny rest
For every dark and troubled night;
And grief may bide an evening guest,
r>ut joy shall come with early light.
And thou, who, o'er thy friend's low
bier,
Sheddest the bitter drops of rain,
Hope that a brighter, happier sphere
Will give him to thy arms again.
Nor let the good man's trust depart,
Though life its common gifts deny,
Though" with a pierced and bleeding
heart.
And spurned of men. he goes to die.
For Ciod hath marked each sorrowiaig
day
And numbered every secret tear,
And heaven's long age of bliss shall
pay
Foi' all his children suffer here.
BRYANT.
io
JUNE.
I GAZED upon the glorious sky
And the green mountains round ;
And thought" that when I came to
He
At rest within the ground,
'Twere pleasant, that in tlowery
June,
When brooks send up a cheerful
tune,
And groves a joyous sound,
The sexton's hand, my grave to
make,
The rich, green mountain turf should
break.
A cell within the frozen mould,
A coffin borne through sleet,
And icy clods above it i-olled,
While fierce the tempests beat —
Away! — I will not think of these —
Bluebe the sky and soft the breeze.
Earth green beneath the feet,
And be the damp mould gently
pressed
Into my narrow place of I'est.
There through the long, long sum-
mer hours
The golden light should lie.
And thick young herbs and gi-oups of
flowers
Stand in their beauty by.
The oriole should build and tell
His love-tale close beside my cell ;
The idle butterfly
Should rest him there, and there be
heard
The housewife bee and humming-
bird.
And what if cheerful shouts at noon
Come, from the village sent.
Or songs of maids, beneath the moon
With fairy laughter blent ?
And what if, in the evening light,
Betrothed lovers walk in sight
Of my low monument '.*
1 would tiie lovely scene around
Might know no sadder sight or sound.
1 know. I know I should not see
The season's glorious show,
\or would its brightness shine for
me,
Nor its wild music flow;
But if, around my place of sleep.
The friends 1 love should come to
weep,
They might not haste to go.
Soft airs, and song, and light, and
bloom,
Should keep them lingering by my
tomb.
These to their softened hearts should
bear
The thought of what has been.
And speak of one who cannot share
The gladness of the scene ;
Whose part, in all the pomp that fills
The circuit of the sununer hills,
Is — that his grave is green;
And deeply would their hearts rejoice
To hear again his living voice.
THE PAST.
Thou unrelenting Past!
Strong are the barriers round thy
dark domain.
And fetters, sure and fast.
Hold all that enter thy unbreathing
reign.
Far in thy realm withdrawn
Old empires sit in sullenness and
gloom.
And glorious ages gone
Lie deep within the shadow of thy
womb.
Childhood, with all its mirth.
Youth, Manhood, Age, that draws
us to the ground.
And last. Mean's Life on earth,
Glide to thy dim dominions, and are
bound.
Thou hast my better years.
Thou hast my earlier friends — the
good — the kind.
Yielded to thee with tears —
The venerable form — the exalted
mind.
74
BRYANT.
My spirit yearns to bring
The lost ones back — yearns with de-
sire intense,
And strnggles hard to wring
Thy bolts apart, and pluck thy cap-
tives thence.
In vain — thy gates deny
All passage save to those who hence
depart;
Nor to the streaming eye
Thou giv'st them back — nor to the
broken heart.
In thy abysses hide
Beauty and excellence unknown —
to thee
Earth's wonder and her pride
Are gathered, as the waters to the
sea;
Labors of good to man.
Unpublished charity, unbroken
faith.—
Love that midst grief began.
And grew with years, and "faltered
not in death.
Full many a mighty name
Lurks in thy depths, unuttered, un-
revered ;
With thee are silent fame,
Forgotten arts, and wisdom disax>
peared.
Thine for a space are they —
Yet shalt thou yield thy treasures up
at last;
Thy gates shall yet give way.
Thy bolts shall fall, inexorable Past!
All that of good and fair
Has gone into thy womb from earliest
time,
Shall then come forth to wear
The glory and the beauty of its
prime.
They have not perished — no !
Kind words, remembered voices once
so sweet.
Smiles, radiant long ago.
And featiu'es, the great soul's appar-
ent seat.
All shall come back, each tie
Of pure affection shall be knit again;
Alone shall evil die.
And sorrow dwell a prisoner in thy
reign.
And then shall I behold
Him, by whose kind paternal side I
sprung.
And her, who, still and cold.
Fills the next grave — the beautiful
and young.
THAXATOrSIS.
To him who in the love of Natiu'e
holds
Communion with her visible forms,
she speaks
A various language; for his gayer
hours
She has a voice of gladness, and a
smile
And eloquence of beauty, and she
glides
Into his daiker musings, with a mild
And healing sympathy, that steals
away
Their sharpness ere he is aware.
When thoughts
Of the last bitter hour come like a
blight
Over thy spirit, and sad images
Of the stern agony, and shroud, and
pall.
And breathless darkness, and the
narrow house.
Make thee to shudder, and grow sick
at heart ; —
Go forth, under the open sky, and
list
To Nature's teachings, while from
all around —
Earth and her waters, and the depths
of air —
Comes a still voice : Yet a few days
and thee
The all-beholding sun shall see no
more
In all his course; nor yet in the cold
ground.
Where" thy pale form was laid, with
many tears,
Nor in the embrace of ocean, shall
exist
Thy image. Earth, that nourished
thee, shall claim
Thy growtli, to be resolved to earth
again.
And, lost each human trace, surren-
dering up
Thine individual being, shalt thou go
To mix forever with the elements.
To be a brother to the insensible
rock
And to the sluggish clod, which the
rude swain
Turns with his share, and treads up-
on. The oak
Shall send his roots abroad, and
pierce thy mould.
Yet not to thine eternal resting-
place
Shalt thou retire alone, — nor couldst
thou \\ish
Couch more magnificent. Thou
shalt lie down
With patriarchs of the infant world
— with kings.
The powerful of the earth — the
wise, the good.
Fair forms, and hoary seers of agas
past,
All in one mighty sepulchre. The
hills
Rock-ribbed and ancient as the sun;
the vales
Stretching in pensive quietness be-
tween ;
The venerable woods; rivers that
move
In majesty, and the complaining
brooks
That make the meadows green; and,
poured round all.
Old ocean's gray and melancholy
waste, —
Are but the solemn decorations all
Of the great tomb of man. The
golden sun.
The planets, all the infinite host of
heaven.
Are shining on the sad abodes of
death,
Through the still. lapse of ages. All
that tread
The globe are but a handful to the
tribes
That slumber in its bosom. — Take
the wings
Of morning, traverse Barca's desert
sands.
Or lose thyself in the continuous
woods
Where rolls the Oregon, and hears
no sound.
Save his own dashings — yet the
dead are there :
And millions in those solittides, since
first
The flight of years began, have laid
them down
In their last sleep; the dead reign
there alone.
So shalt thou rest, and what if thou
withdraw
In silence from the living, and no
friend
Take note of thy departure ? All
that breathe
Will share thy destiny. The gay
will laugh
When thou art gone; the solemn
brood of care
Plod on, and each one as before will
chase
His favorite phantom ; yet all these
shall leave
Their mirth and their employments,
and shall come.
And make their bed with thee. As
the long train
Of ages glide away, the sons of men.
The "youth in life's green spring, and
he who goes
In the full strength of years, matron,
and maid.
And the sweet babe, and the gray-
headed man, —
Shall one by one be gathered to thy
side,
By those who in their turn shall fol-
low them.
So live, that when thy sunnnons
comes to join
The innumerable caravan, which
moves
To that mysterious realm, where each
shall take
His chamber in tlie silent halls of
death.
Thou go not, like the quarry-slave
at niglit,
Scourged to his dungeon, but, sus-
tained and sootlied
By an unfaltering trust, approach
thy grave
Like one v/ho wraps the drapery of
his couch
About him, and lies down to pleas-
ant dreams.
THE EVENING WIND.
Spirit that breathest through my
lattice, thou
That coolest the twilight of the
sultry day,
Gratefully flows thy freshness I'ound
my brow :
Thou liast been out upon the
deep at play,
Riding all (lay the wild blue waves
till now,
lioughening their crests, and
scattering high their spray
And swelling the white sail. I wel-
come thee
To the scorched land, thou wanderer
of the sea !
Nor I alone — a thousand bosoms
round
Inhale thee in the fulness of de-
light;
And languid forms rise uj), and
pulses bound
Livelier, at coming of the wind
of night;
And, languishing to hear thy grate-
ful sound,
Lies the vast inland stretched
beyond the sight.
Go forth into the gathering shade;
go forth,
God's blessing breathed upon the
fainting earth !
Go, rock the little wood-bird in his
nest.
Curl the still waters, bright with
stars, and rouse
The wide old wood from his majes-
tic rest,
Summoning, from the innumer-
able boughs.
The strange, deep harmonies that
haunt his breast:
Pleasant shall be thy way where
meekly bows
The shutting flower, and darkling
waters pass,
And where the o'ershadowing branch-
es sweep the grass.
The faint old man shall lean his silver
head
To feel thee ; thou shalt kiss the
child asleep,
And diy the moistened curls that
overspread
His temples, while his breathing
grows more deep:
And they who stand about the sick
man's bed,
Shall joy to listen to thy distant
sweep,
And softly part his curtains to allow
Thy visit, grateful to his burning
bi'ow.
Go — but the circle of eternal change.
Which is the life of nature, shall
restore,
\yith sounds and scents from all thy
mighty I'ange,
Thee to tliy birthplace of the deep
once more;
Sweet odors in the sea-air, sweet and
strange.
Shall tell the home-sick mariner
of the shore ;
And, listening to thy murnuu', he
shall deem
He hears the rustling loaf and run-
ning stream.
LIFE.
On, Life, I breathe thee in the breeze,
I feel thee bounding in my veins,
I see thee in these stretching trees.
These flowers, this still rock's
mossy stains.
^
BRYANT.
This stream of odor flowing by,
From clover field and clumps of
pine,
This music, thrilling all the sky,
From all the morning birds, are
thine.
Thou fill'st with joy this little
one,
That leaps and shouts beside me
here,
Wliere Isar's clay white rivulets run
Through the dark woods like
frighted deer.
Ah! must thy mighty breath, that
wakes
Insect and bird, and flower and
tree,
From the low-trodden dust, and makes
Their daily gladness, pass from
me —
Pass, pulse by pulse, till o'er the
ground
These limbs, now strong, shall creep
with pain.
And this fair world of sight and
sound
Seem fading into night again ?
The things, oh. Life! thou quickenest,
all
Strive upward towards the broad
bright sky.
Upward and outward, and they fall
Back to earth's bosom when they
die.
All that have borne the touch of
death,
All that shall live, lie mingled
there.
Beneath that veil of bloom and
breath,
That living zone 'twixt earth and
air.
There lies my chamber dark and
still.
The atoms trampled by my feet.
There wait, to take the place I fill
In the sweet air and sunshine
sweet.
Well, I have had my turn, have
been
Raised from the darkness of the
clod.
And for a glorious moment seen
The brightness of the skirts of
Goil ;
And knew the light \\ithin my
breast.
Though wavering oftentimes and
dim.
The power, the will, that never
rest.
And cannot die, were all from Ilim.
Dear child! I know that thou wilt
grieve
To see me taken from thy love.
Wilt seek my grave at Sabbath eve.
And weep, and scatter flowers
above.
Thy little heart will soon be healed,
And being shall be bliss, till thou
To younger forms of life must yield
The ptace thou fill'st with beauty
now.
When we descend to dust again.
Where will the final dwelling be
Of Thought and all its memories
then.
My love for thee, and thine for
me ?
THE FRINGED GENTIAN.
Tiiou blossom bright with autumn
dew,
And colored with the heaven's own
blue.
That openest when the quiet light
Succeeds the keen and frosty night.
Thou comest not when violets lean
O'er wandering brooks and springs
unseen,
Or columbines, in purple dressed.
Nod o'er the ground-bird's hidden
nest,
Thou waitest late and coin'st alone,
When woods are bare and birds are
flown,
And frosts and shortening days por-
tend
Tlie aged year is near liis end.
Then doth tliy sweet and quiet eye
Look tlu'ougli its fringes to the sliy,
Blue — blue — as if that sliy let fall
A flower from its cerulean wall.
I would that thus, when I shall see
The hour of death draAV near to me,
Hope, blossoming within my heart,
May look to heaven as 1 depart.
THE CROWDED STREET.
Let me move slowly through tlie
street.
Filled with an ever-shifting train,
Amid the sound of steps that beat
The murmuring walks like autumn
rain.
How fast the flitting figures come!
The mild, the fierce, the stony face;
Some bright Avitli tliouglitless smiles,
and some
Where secret tears have left their
trace.
They pass — to toil, to strife, to rest;
To halls in whicli the feast is
spread ;
To chambers where the funeral guest
In silence sits beside the dead.
And some to happy homes repair,
Wliere children, pressing cheek to
cheek.
With mute caresses shall declare
The tenderness they cannot speak.
And some, who walk in calmness liere,
Shall shudder as they reacli the
door
Where one who made tlieir dwelling
dear.
Its flower, its light, is seen no
more.
Youth, with pale cheek and slender
frame,
And dreams of greatness in thine
eye!
(ioest thou to build an early name,
Or early in the task to die ?
Keen son of trade, with eager l)row !
Who is now fluttering in thy snare ?
Thy golden fortunes, tower they now.
Or melt the glittering spires in air?
Who of this crowd to-night shall
tread
The dance till daylight gleam
again '?
Who sorrow o'er the untimely dead ?
Who writhe in throes of mortal
pain ?
Some, famine-struck, shall think
how long
The cold dark hours, how slow the
light!
And some who flaunt amid the
throng.
Shall hide in dens of shame to-
night.
Each, where his tasks or pleasures
call.
They pass and heed each other not.
There is who heeds, who holds them
all.
In His large love and boundless
thought.
These struggling tides of life that
seem
In wayward, aimless course to
tend.
Are eddies of the mighty stream
That rolls to its appointed end.
THE FUTURE LIFE.
How shall I know thee in the sphere
which keeps
The disembodied spirits of the dead,
^\^len all of thee that time could
wither, sleeps
And perishes among the dust we
tread ?
BRYANT.
79
For I shall feel the sting of ceaseless
pain
If there I meet thy gentle presence
not;
Nor hear the voice I love, nor read
again
In thy serenest eyes the tender
thought.
Will not thy own meek heart demand
me there ?
That heart whose fondest throbs
to me were given '?
My name on earth was ever in thy
prayer,
And must thou never utter it in
heaven '?
In meadows fanned by heaven's life-
breathing wind,
In the resplendence of that glo-
rious sphere.
And larger movements of the unfet-
tered mind,
Wilt thou forget the love that
joined us here ?
The love that lived through all the
stormy past,
And meekly with my harsher na-
ture bore,
And deeper grew, and tenderer to
the last.
Shall it expire with life, and be no
more ?
A happier lot than mine, and larger
light,
Await thee there; for thou hast
bowed thy will
In cheerfid homage to the rule of
right,
And lovest all, and renderest good
for ill.
For me, the sordid cares in which I
dwell,
Shrink and consume my heart, as
heat the scroll ;
And wrath has left its scar — that
fire of hell
Has left its frightful scar upon my
soul.
Yet though thou wearest the glory of
the sky.
Wilt thou not keep the same be-
loved name.
The same fair thoughtful brow, and
gentle eye.
Lovelier in heaven's sweet climate,
yet the same ?
Shalt thou not teach me, in that
calmer home,
The wisdom that I learned so ill in
this —
The wisdom which is love — till I
become
Thy fit companion in that laud of
bliss ?
THE COXQUEROR'S GRAVE.
AViTHiN this lowly grave a Conqueror
lies,
And yet the monument proclaims
it not,
Nor round the sleeper's name hath
chisel wrought
The emblems of a fame that never
dies.
Ivy and amaranth in a graceful sheaf.
Twined with the laurel's fair, impe-
rial leaf.
A simple name alone,
To the great world unknown.
Is gravenliere, and wild flowers, ris-
ing round,
Meek meadow-sweet and violets of
the ground,
Lean lovingly against the humble
stone.
Here in the quiet earth, they laid
apart
No man of iron mould and bloody
hands.
Who sought to wreck upon the cow-
ering lands
The passions that consumed his
restless heart;
But one of tender spirit and delicate
frame,
Gentlest in mien and mind.
Of gentle womankind,
80
BRYANT.
Timidly shrinking from the breath
of blame ;
One in whose eyes the smile of kind-
ness made
Its haunt, like flowers by sunny
brooks in May,
Yet, at the thought of others' pain,
a shade
Of sweeter sadness chased the
smile away.
Nor deem that when the hand that
moidders here
Was raised in menace, realms were
chilled with fear.
And armies mustered at the sign,
as when
Clouds rise on clouds before the rainy
East, —
Gray captains leading bands of
veteran men
And fiery youths to be the vulture's
feast.
Not thus were waged the mighty wars
that gave
The victory to her who fills this
grave;
Alone her task was wrought,
Alone the battle fought;
Through that long strife her constant
hope was staid
On C4od alone, nor looked for other
aid.
She met the hosts of sorrow with a
look
That altered not beneath the fiown
they wore.
And soon the lowering brood were
tamed, and took,
Meekly, her gentle rule, and
frowned no more.
Her soft hand put aside the assaults
of wrath,
And calndy broke in twain
The fiery shafts of pain.
And rent the nets of passion from
her path.
By that victorious hand despair
was slain.
With love she vanquished hate and
overcame
Evil with good, in her great Master's
name.
Her glory is not of this shatlowy
state
Glory that with the fleeting season
dies;
But when she entered at the sapphire
gate
What joy was radiant in celestial
eyes!
How heaven's bright depths with
sounding welcomes rung,
And flowers of heaven by shining
hands were flung;
And He who, long before.
Pain, scorn, and sorrow bore,
The Mighty Sufferer, with aspect
sweet.
Smiled on the timid stranger from
his seat;
He who returning, glorious, from the
grave.
Dragged Death, disarmed, in chains,
a crouching slave.
See, as I linger here, the sun grows
low;
Cool airs are nuu'muring that the
night is near.
Oh, gentle sleeper, from thy grave I
go
Consoled though sad, in hope and
yet in fear.
Brief is the time, I know,
The warfare scarce begun ;
Yet all may win the triumphs thou
hast won.
Still flows the fount whose waters
sti'engthened thee ;
The victors' names are yet too few
to fill
Heaven's mighty roll; the glorious
armory,
That ministered to thee is open
still.
[Frovi an unfinished poem.]
AN EVENING HE VERY.
The summer day is closed — the
sim is set;
Well they have done their office,
those bright hours.
The latest of whose train goes softly
out
In the reil West. The green blade
of the ground
Has risen, and herds have cropped
it ; the young twig
Has spread its plaited tissues to the
sun ;
Flowers of the garden and the waste
have blown
And witliei'ed ; seeds have fallen npon
the soil,
From bursting cells, and in their
graves await
Their resurrection. Insects from
the pools
Have filled the air awhile with hum-
ming wings.
That now are still forever; painted
moths
Have wandered the blue sky, and
died again ;
The mother-bird hath broken for
her brooil
Their prison shell, or shoved them
from the nest,
Plumed for their earliest flight. In
bright alcoves.
In woodland cottages with barky
walls, [town.
In noisome cells of the tumultuous
Mothers have clasped with joy the
new-born babe.
Graves by the lonely forest, by the
shore
Of rivers and of ocean, by the ways
Of the thronged city, have been hol-
lowed out
And filled, and closed. This day
hatli parted friends
That ne'er before were parted; it
hath knit
New friendships; it hath seen the
maiden pliglit
Her faith, and trust her peace to him
who long
Had wooed ; and it hath heard, from
lips M'hicli late
Were eloquent of love, the first harsh
word.
That told the wedded one, her peace
was flown.
Farewell to the sweet sunshine!
One glad day
Is added now to childhood's merry
days.
And one calm day to those of quiet
age. •
Still the fleet hours run on; and as I
lean,
Amid the thickening darkness, lamps
are lit.
By those who watcli the dead, and
those who twine
Flowers for the bride. The mother
from the eyes
Of her sick infant shades the pain-
ful light.
And sadly listens to his quick-drawn
breath.
O thou great Movement of the
Universe,
Or change, or flight of Time — for
ye are one !
That bearest, silently, this visible
scene
Into night's shadow and the stream-
ing rays
Of starlight, whither art thou bear-
ing me ?
I feel the mighty current sweep me
on.
Yet know not whither. Man fore-
tells afar
The courses of the stars; the very
hour
He knows when they shall darken or
grow bright ;
Yet doth the eclipse of Sorrow and
of Death
Come unforewarned. Who next, of
those I love.
Shall pass from life, or sadder yet,
shall fall
From virtue ? Strife with foes, or
bitterer strife
With friends, or shame and general
scorn of men —
Which who can bear ? — or the fierce
rack of pain.
Lie they within my path ? Or shall
the years
Push me, with soft and inoffensive
pace,
Into the stilly twilight of mv
age?
Or do the portals of another life
82
BURNS.
Even now, while 1 am glorying in my
strength,
Impend around me? OI beyond
that bourne,
In the vast cycle of being which be-
gins
At that broad threshold, with what
fairer forms
.Shall the great law of change and
progress clothe
Its workings? Gently — so have
good men taught —
Gently, and without grief, the old
shall glide
Into the new; the eternal flow of
things,
Like a bright river of the fields of
heaven.
Shall journey onward in perpetual
peace.
Robert Burns.
TO MAR y IN HE A VEN.
Tiiou ling'ring star, with less'ning
ray,
That lov'st to greet the early morn,
Again thou usherest in the day
My Mary from my soul was torn.
O Mary ! dear departed shade !
Where is thy place of blissful rest?
Seest thou thy lover lowly laid ?
Hearest thou the groans that rend
his breast ?
That sacred hour can I forget ?
Can I forget the hallowed grove.
Where by the winding Ayr we met.
To live one day of parting love ?
Eternity will not efface
Those records dear of transports
past;
Thy image at our last embrace ;
Ah! little thought we 'twas our
last;
Ayr gurgling kissed his pebbled shore,
O'erhmig with wild woods, thicken-
ing green ;
'J'lie fragrant birch, and hawthorn
hoar.
Twined amorous i-ound the raptured
scene.
The flowers sprang wanton to be
prest.
The birds sang love on every
spray, —
Till too, too soon, the glowing west
I'roclaimed the speed of winged
dav.
Still o'er these scenes my memory
wakes,
And fondly broods with miser care !
Time but the impression deeper
makes.
As streams their channels deeper
wear.
My Mary, dear departed shade !
Where is thy blissful place of
rest ?
Seest thou thy lover lowly laid ?
Hearest thou the groans that rend
his breast ?
FOR A- THAT AND A' THAT.
Is there, for honest poverty,
That hangs his head, and a' that ?
The coward-slave, we pass him by.
AVe dare be poor for a' that !
For a" that, and a' that.
Our toils obscure, and a' that :
The rank is but the guinea stamp;
The man's the gowd for a' that.
What tho' on hamely fare we
dine.
Wear hodden-gray, and a' that ;
Gie fools their silks, and knaves their
wine,
A man's a inan for a' that.
For a' that, and a' that,
Their tinsel show, and a' that :
The honest man, tho' e'er sae
poor.
Is kinsr o' men for a' that.
1^
BURNS.
83
Ye see yon birkie, ca'd a lord,
\Vha struts, and stares, and a' that;
Tlio* hundreds worship at his word.
He's but a coof for a' tliat:
For a' that and a' that,
His ribband, star, and a' tliat,
Tlie man of independent mind.
He looks and laughs at a' that.
A iirince can mak a belted knight,
A marquis, duke, and a' that ;
But an honest man's aboon his might,
(Juid faith, he raauna fa' that!
For a' tliat, and a' that.
Their dignities, and a' that,
The pith o' sense, and pride o'
worth.
Are higher ranks than a' that.
Then let us pray that come it may,
As come it will for a' that.
That sense and worth, o'er a' the
earth'
May bear the gree, and a" that
For a' that, and a' that.
It's coming yet, for a' that;
That man toman, the warld o'er
Shall brothers be for a' that.
STANZAS IN PROSPECT OF DEATH.
■\ViiY am 1 loth to leave this earthly
scene !
Have I so found it full of pleasing
charms ?
home drops of joy with draughts of
ill between:
Some gleams of sunshine 'mid re-
newing stomis ;
Is it departing pangs my soul alarms ?
Or death's unlovely, dreary, dark
abode ?
For guilt, for guilt, my terrors are in
arms:
I tremble to approach an angry
God.
And justly smart beneath his sin-
avenging rod.
Fain would 1 say, "Forgive my foul
offence! "
Fain promise nevei' more to disobey ;
But, should my Author health again
dispense,
Again I might desert fair virtue's
way ;
Again in folly's path might go astray;
Again exalt the brute, and sink
the man;
Then how should 1 for heavenly mer-
cy pray.
Who act so counter heavenly mer-
cy's plan ?
Who sin so oft have mourned, yet to
temptation ran ?
O Thou, great Governor of all below !
If I may dare a lifted eye to Thee,
Thy nod can make the tempest cease
to blow.
And still the tumult of the raging
sea;
With that controlling pow'r assist
ev'n me,
Those headlong furious passions to
confine.
For all unfit I feel my powers to be,
To rule their torrent in the allowed
line;
Oh, aid me with thy help, Onuiip-
otence Divine!
TO A MOUNTAIN DAISY.
Ou turning one down with the plough, in
April, 1786.
Wee, modest, crimson-tipped flower,
Thou's met me in an evil hour:
For I maun crush amang the stoure
Thy slender stem :
To spare thee now is past my power,
Thou bonnie gem.
Alas! it's no thy neebor sweet.
The bonnie lark, companion meet !
Bending thee 'mang the dewy weet !
Wi' spreckl'd breast.
When upward-springing, blythe, to
greet
The purpling east.
Gauld blew tlie bitter-biting north
Upon thy early, humble birth ;
BURNS.
Yet cheerfully thou glinted forth
Amid the storm,
Scarce rear'd above the parent-earth
Thy tender form.
The flaunting flowers our gardens
yield
High sheltering woods and wa's maun
shield,
But thou beneath the random bield
O' clod, or stane,
Adorns the histie stibble-field,
Unseen, alane.
There, in thy scanty mantle clad.
Thy snawy bosom sunward spread.
Thou lifts thy unassuming heatl
In humble guise;
Btit now the share uptears thy bed,
And low thou lies !
Such is the fate of artless maid,
Sweet flow'ret of the rural shade!
By love's simplicity betrayed,
And guileless trust,
Till she, like thee, all soiled, is laid
Low i' the dust.
Such is the fate of simple bard.
On life's rough ocean luckless starred I
Unskilful he to note the card
Of prudent lore.
Till billows rage, and gales blow
hard.
And whelm him o'er !
Such fate to suffering worth is given.
Who long with wants and woes has
striven,
By liinuan pride or cunning driven
To misery's brink,
Till, wrenched of every stay but
heaven.
He, ruined, sink!
Even thou who mournest the daisy's
fate,
That fate is thine — no distant date ;
Stern Kuin's ploughshare drives,
elate.
Full on thy bloom.
Till, crushed beneath the furrow's
weight
Shall be thy doom !
JOH^r A^TDEJiSOX, MV JO.
John Anderson, my jo, John,
When we were first acquent,
Your locks were like the raven,
Your bonnie brow was brent ;
But now your brow is held, John,
Your locks are like the snaw;
But blessings on your frosty pow,
John Anderson, my jo.
John Anderson, my jo, John,
We clamb the hill thegither;
And monie a canty day, .John,
We've hail wi' ane anither:
Now we maun totter down, John,
But hanil in hand we'll go.
And sleep thegither at the foot,
John Anderson, my jo.
FARE W EEL TO NAXCY.
Ae fond kiss, and then we sever!
Ae fareweel, alas, forever!
Deep in heart-wrung tears I'll pledge
thee !
Warring sighs and groans I'll wage
thee !"
Who shall say that fortune grieves
him,
While the star of hope she leaves
him !
Me, nae cheerfu' twinkle lights nie;
Dark despair around benights me.
I'll ne'er blame my partial fancy,
Naething could resist my Nancy ;
But to see her, was to love her;
Love but her, and love for ever.
Had we never loved sae kindly.
Had we never loved sae blindly,
Never met — or never parted,
AVe had ne'er been broken hearted!
Fare thee weel, thou first and fairest!
Fare thee weel, thou best and dearest!
Thine be ilka joy and treasure,
Peace, enjoyment, love, and pleasure.
Ae fond kiss, and then we sever;
Ae fareweel, alas, for ever!
Deep in heart- wnmg tears I'll pledge
thee, [thee.
Warring sighs and groans I'll wage
BUBNS.
[From To the Unco Guld.]
GOD, THE ONLY JUST JUDGE.
Then gently scan your brother man,
Still gentler sister woman ;
Tlio' they may gang a kennie wrang,
To step aside is human:
One point nuist still be greatly dark,
The moving 117/?/ they do it;
And just as lamely can ye mark
How far perhaps they rue it.
Who made the heart, 'tis He alone
Decidedly can try us, [tone.
He knows each chord — its various
Each spring — its various bias:
Then at the balance let's be mute,
We never can adjust it;
What's done we partly may compute,
But know not what's resisted.
HIGHLAND MARY.
Ye banks, and braes, and streams
around
The castle o' Montgomery,
Green be your woods, and fair your
flowers,
Your waters never drumlie !
There simmer first unfald her robes,
And there the langest tarry ;
For there I took my last fareweel
O' my sweet Highland Mary.
How sweetly bloomed the gay green
birk.
How rich the hawthorn's blossom.
As underneath their fragrant shade,
I clasped her to my bosom !
The golden hours, on angel wings,
Flew o'er me and my dearie;
For dear to me, as light and life.
Was my sweet Highland Mary.
W^i' monie a vow, and lock'd embrace.
Our parting was f u' tender ;
And, ijledging aft to meet again,
We tore oursels asunder;
But oh! fell death's untimely frost.
That nipt my flower sae early I
Now green's the sod, and cauld's the
clay.
That wraps my Highland Mary.
Oh, pale, pale now, those rosy lips,
I aft hae kissed sae fondly !
And closed for aye the sparkling
glance.
That dwelt on me sae kindly!
And mouldering now in silent dust.
That heart that lo'ed me dearly!
But still within my bosom's core
Sliall live my Highland Mary.
MAN WAS MADE TO MOURN.
A DIRGE.
When chill November's surly blast
Made fields and forests bare,
One evening, as 1 wandered forth
Along the banks of Ayi',
I spied a man, whose aged step
Seemed weary, worn with care;
His face was furrowed o'er with years,
And hoary was his hair.
Young stranger, whither wanderest
thou ?
Began the reverend sage ;
Does thirst of wealth thy step con-
strain.
Or youthful pleasure's rage ?
Or, haply, prest with cares and woes,
Too soon thou hast began
To wander forth, with me, to mourn
The miseries of man.
The sun that overhangs yon moors,
Outspreading far and wide.
Where hundreds labor to support
A haughty lordling's pride;
Fve seen yon weary winter-sun
Twice forty times return ;
.Vnd every time has added proofs
That man was made to mourn.
O man ! while in thy early years,
How prodigal of time !
Misspending all thy precious hours.
Thy glorious youthful prime!
Alternate follies take the sway;
Licentious passions burn ;
Which tenfold force give nature's law.
That man was made to mourn.
i
H6
BUSHNELL.
Look not alone on youthful prime,
Or manhood's active might;
Man then is useful to his kind,
■Supported is his right.
But see him on the edge of life,
With cares and sorrows worn ;
Then age and want, oh ! ill-matched
pair!
Show man was made to mourn.
A few seem favorites of fate.
In Pleasure's lap carest;
Yet, think not all the rich and great
Are likewise truly blest.
But, oh ! what crowds in every land
Are wretched and forlorn.
Tliro' weary life this lesson learn.
That man was made to mourn.
Many and sharp the numerous ills
Inwoven with our frame !
More pointed still we make ourselves,
Kegret, remorse, and shame!
And man, whose heaven-erected face
The smiles of love adorn,
Man's inhumanity to man
Makes countless thousands mourn !
See yonder poor, o'erlabored wight.
So abject, mean, and vile.
Who begs a brother of the earth
To give him leave to toil ;
And see his lordly fellow-worm
The poor petition spurn.
Unmindful, tho' a weeping wife
And helpless offspring mourn.
If I'm designed yon lordling's slave —
By nature's law designed, —
Why was an independent wish
E'er planted in my mind ?
If not, why am 1 subject to
His cruelty or scorn ?
Or why has man the will and power
To make his fellow mourn '?
Yet, let not this too much, my son.
Disturb thy youthful breast:
This partial view of humankind
Is surely not the last !
The poor, oppressed, honest man
Had never, sure, been born.
Had there not been some recompense
To comfort those that mourn !
O death! the poor man's dearest
friend.
The kindest and the best !
Welcome the hour my aged limbs
Are laid with thee at rest !
The great, the wealthy, fear thy blow
From pomp and pleasure torn ;
But, oh! a blest relief to those
That wear>--laden mourn !
Louisa Bushnell.
DELA y.
Taste the sweetness of delaying,
Till the hour shall come for saying
That I love you with my soul ;
Have you never thought your heart
Finds a something in the part.
It would miss from out the whole?
In this rosebud you have given.
Sleeps that perfect rose of heaven
That in Fancy's garden blows;
W^ake it not by touch or sound,
Lest, perchance, 'twere lost, not
found.
In the opening of the rose.
Dear to me is this reflection
Of a fair and far perfection,
Shining through a veil undrawn;
Ask no question, then, of fate;
Yet a little longer wait.
In the beauty of the dawn.
Through our mornings, veiled and
tender.
Shines a day of golden si)len(lor,
Never yet fulfilled by day;
Ah! if love be made complete.
Will it, can it, be so sweet
As this ever sweet delay?
BUTLER.
87
Samuel Butler.
Love is too great a happiness
For wretched mortals to possess ;
For could it hold inviolate
Against those cruelties of fate
Which all felicities below
By rigid laws are subject to.
It would become a bliss too hitrh
For perishing mortality ;
Translate to earth the joys above ;
For nothing goes to Heaven but Love.
All love at first, like generous wrne,
Ferments and frets until 'tis fine;
For when 'tis settled on the lee,
And from the impurer matter free.
Becomes the richer still, the older,
And proves the pleasanter, the colder.
William Allen Butler.
WORK AND WOUSHIP.
" Laborare est orare. " — St. Augitstixe.
Charlemagne, the mighty mon-
arch.
As through Metten AYood he
strayed,
Fomid the holy hermit, Hutto,
Toiling in the forest glade.
In his hand the woodman's hatchet.
By his side the knife and twine.
There he cut and bound the faggots
From the gnarled and stunted pine.
Well the monarch knew the hermit
For his pious Avorks and cares,
And the wonders which had followed
From his vigils, fasts, and prayers.
Much he marvelled now to see him
Toiling thus, with axe and cord ;
And he cried in scorn, " O Father,
Is it thus you serve the Lord ? "
But the hermit resting neither
Hand nor hatchet, meekly said :
" He who does no daily labor
May not ask for daily bread.
" Think not that my graces shunber
While I toil throughout the day :
For all honest work is worship.
And to labor is to pray.
"■ Think not that the heavenly bless-
ing
From the workman's hand removes;
Who does best his task appointed.
Him the Master most api) roves. "'
While he spoke the hermit, pausing
For a moment, raised his eyes
Where the overhanging branches
Swayed beneath the sunset skies.
Through the dense and vaulted for-
est
Straight the level simbeam came.
Shining like a gilded rafter.
Poised upon a sculptured frame.
Suddenly, with kindling features.
While he breathes a silent prayer,
See, the hermit throws his hatchet,
Lightly, upward in the air.
Bright the Mell-worn steel is gleam-
ing,
As it flashes through the shade,
And descending, lo! the sunbeam
Holds it dangling by the blade !
"See, my son," exclaimed the her-
mit, —
" See the token heaven has sent;
Thus to humble, patient effort
Faith's miraculous aid is lent.
BUTLER.
Toiling, hoping, often fainting,
As we labor, Love Divine
Through the shadows pours its sun-
light,
Crowns the work, vouchsafes the
sign!"
Homeward, slowly, went the mon-
arch.
Till he reached his palace hall,
Where he strode among his warriors.
He the bravest of them all.
Soon the Benedictine Abbey
Rose beside the hermit's cell ;
He, by royal hands invested,
Ruled, as abbot, long and well.
Now beside the rushing Danube
Still its ruined walls remain.
Telling of the hermit's patience.
And the zeal of Charlemagne.
THE BUSTS OF GOETHE AND
SCHILLER.
This is Goethe, with a forehead
Like the fabled front of Jove;
In its massive lines the tokens
More of majesty than love.
This is Schiller, in whose features.
With their passionate calm regard.
We behold the true ideal
Of the high, heroic bard,
Whom the inward world of feeling
And the outward world of sense
To the endless labor summon,
And the endless recompense.
These are they, sublime and silent.
From whose living lips have rung
Words to be remembered ever
In the noble German tongue;
Thoughts whose inspiration, kindling
Into loftiest speech or song,
Still through all the listening ages
Pours its torrent swift and strong.
As to-day in sculptured marble
Side by side the poets stand.
So tbey stood in life's great strug-
gle?
Side by side and hand to hand,
In the ancient German city.
Dowered with many a deathless
name,
Where they dwelt and toiled together,
Sharing each the others fame.
One till evening's lengthening shad-
ows
Gently stilled his faltering lips,
But the other's sun at noonday
Shrouded in a swift eclipse.
There their names are household
treasures.
And the simplest child you meet
Guides you where the house of Goethe
Fronts upon the quiet street ;
And, hard by, the modest mansion
Where full many a heart has felt
Memories uncounted clustering
Round the words, "Here Schiller
dwelt."
In the churchyard Ijoth are biu'ied,
Straight beyond the narrow gate,
In the mausoleum sleeping.
With Duke Charles, in sculptured
state.
For the monarch loved the poets.
Called them to him from afar.
Wooed them near his court to lin-
ger,
And the planets sought the star.
He, his larger gifts of fortune
With their larger fame to blend,
Living counted it an honor
That they named him as their
friend ;
Dreading to be all forgotten,
Still their greatness to divide.
Dying prayed to have his poets
Buried one on either side.
BUTTS — BUTTERWURTH.
89
Bui this suited not the gold-laceil
Usliers of the royal tomb,
Wliere the princely house of Weimar
ttlmubered iu majestic gloom.
So they ranged the coffins justly,
Each with fitting rank and stamp,
And with shows of court precedence
Mocked the grave's sepulchral
damp.
Fitly now the clownish sexton
Narrow courtier-rules rebukes ;
Plrst he shows the grave of Goethe,
bchillers then, and last — the
Duke's.
Vainly 'midst these truthful shadows
Pride would flaunt her painted wing;
Here the monarch waits in silence,
And ihe poet is the king!
Mary F. Butts.
OTHEn MOTH E lis.
Mother, in the sunset glow,
Crooning ehild-songs sweet and low,
Eyes soft shining, heart at rest,
Kose-leaf cheek against thy breast.
Thinkest thou of those who weep
O'er their babies fast asleep
Where the evening dews lie wet
On their broidered coverlet,
Whose cold cradle is the grave.
Where wild roses nod and wave,
Taking for their blossoms fair
What a spirit once did wear ?
Mother, crooning soft and low,
Let not all thy fancies go,
Like swift birds, to the blue skies
Of thy darling's happy eyes.
Count thy baby's curls for beads.
As a sweet saint intercedes.
But on some fair ringlet's gold
Let a tender prayer be told,
For the mother, all alone.
Who for singing maketh moan,
Who doth ever vainly seek
Dimpled arms and velvet cheek.
Hezekiah Butterworth.
THE FOUKTAIX OF YOUTH.
A di;eam of roNCE de leon.
A STORY of Ponce de Leon,
A voyager withered and old.
Who came to the sunny Antilles,
In quest of a country of gold,
lie was wafted past islands of si^ices.
As bright as the emerald seas.
Where all the forests seem singing.
So thick were the birds on the trees ;
The sea was clear as the azure.
And so deep and so pure was the sky
That the jasper-walled city seemed
shining
Just out of tlie reach of the eye.
By day his light canvas he shifted.
And round strange harbors and
bars :
By niglit, on the full tides he drifted,
'Neath the low-hanging lamps of
the stars. [sunset,
'Neath the glimmering gates of the
In the twilight empurpled and dim.
The sailors uplifted their voices,
And sang to the Virgin a hymn.
' ' Thank the Lord ! "said De Leon, the
sailor,
At tlie close of the rounded refrain ;
" Thank the Lord, the Almighty, who
blesses
The ocean-swept banner of S^iain I
90
BUTTERWUMTH.
The shadowy world is behind us,
The shining Cipango before ;
Each morning llie sun rises brigliter
On ocean, and island, and shore.
And still shall our spirits grow lighter,
As prospects more glowing unfold;
Then on, merry men! to Cipango,
To the west, and the regions of
gold!"
There came to De Leon the sailor.
Some Indian sages, who told
Of a region so bright that the waters
Were sprinkled with islands of gold.
And they added: " The leafy Bimini,
A fair land of grottos and bowers
Is there; and a wonderful fountain
Upsprings from its gardens of
flowers.
That fountain gives life to the dying,
And youth to the aged restores :
They flourish in beauty eternal,
Who set but their fee^ on its
shores!"
Then answered De Leon, the sailor:
" I am withered, and wrinkled, and
old;
I would rather discover that fountain
Than a country of diamonds and
gold."
Away sailed De Leon, the sailor;
Away with a wonderful glee.
Till the birds were more rare in the
azure.
The dolphins more rare in the sea.
Away from the shady Bahamas.
Over waters no sailor had seen.
Till again on his wandering vision.
Rose clustering islands of green.
Still onward he sped till the breezes
Were laden with odors, and lo!
A country embedded witli flowers,
A country with rivers aglow!
More bright than the sunny Antilles,
More fair than the shady Azor^^.^.
"Thank the Lord!" said De Leon,
the sailor.
As feasted his eye on the shores,
'■ We have come to a region, my
brothers,
More lovely than earth, of a truth;
And here is the life-giving fountain, —
Tlie l)(\'iutifu] Fountain of Youth."
Then landed De Leon, the sailor.
Unfurled his old banner, and sung;
But he felt very wrinkled and with-
ered.
All around was so fresh and so
young.
The palms, ever-verdant, were bloom-
ing,
Their blossoms e'en margined the
seas;
O'er the streams of the forests bright
flowers
Hmig deep from the branches of
trees.
"Praise the Lord!"' sang De Leon,
the sailor;
His heart was with rapture aflame;
And he said: "Be the name of this
region
By Florida given to fame.
'Tis a fair, a delectable country.
More lovely than earth, of a truth ;
I soon shall ^^''^I'take of the foun-
tain, —
The beautiful Fomitain of Youth ! "
But wandered De Leon, the sailor.
In search of the fountain in vain;
No waters were there to restore him
To freshness and beauty again.
And his anchor he lifted, and uuu--
nuu'ed.
As the tears gathered fast in his eye,
" I must leave this fair land of the
flowers.
Go back o'er the ocean, and die,"
Then back by the dreary Tortugas,
And back by the shady Azores,
lie was borne on the storm-smitten
■waters
To the calm of his own native
shores.
And that he grew older and older.
His footsteps enfeebled gave proof.
Still he thirsted in dreams for the
fountain,
The beautiful Fountain of Youth.
One day the old sailor lay dying
On tlie shores of a tropical isle.
And his heart was enkindled with
rapture; | smile.
And his face lighted up with a
BYIWK
91
He thought of the sunny Antilles,
He thought of the shady Azores,
He thought of the dreamy Bahamas,
He thought of fair Florida's shores.
And, when in his mind he passed over
His wonderful travels of old.
He thought of the heavenly country,
Of the city of jasper and gold.
" Thank the Lord!" said De Leon,
the sailor, [the truth,
" Thank the Lord for the light of
1 now am approaching the fountain,
The beautiful Fountain of Youth."
The cabin was silent: at twilight
They heard the birds singing a
psalm.
And the wind of the ocean low sigh-
ing
Through groves of the orange and
palm.
The sailor still lay on his pallet,
'Neath the low-hanging vines of
the roof;
His soul had gone forth to dis-
cover
The beautiful Fountain of Youth.
Lord Byron (George Gordon Noel).
I'HOMETIIEUS.
Titan ! to whose immortal eyes
The sufferings of mortality.
Seen in their sad reality.
Were not as things that gods despise;
What was thy pity's recompense ?
A silent suffering, and intense;
The rock, the vultm-e, and the
chain.
All that the proud can feel of pain.
The agony they do not show
The suffocating sense of woe,
Which speaks but in its loneliness.
And then is jealous lest the sky
Should have a listener, nor will sigh
Until its voice is echoless.
Titan ! to thee the strife was given
Between the suffering and the
will.
Which torture where they cannot
kill;
And the inexorable heaven,
And the deaf tyranny of fate,
The ruling principle of hate,
Which for its pleasure doth create
Tlie things it may annihilate,
Refused tliee even the boon to die;
The wretched gift eternity
Was thine — and thou hast borne it
well.
All that the Thunderer wrung from
thee
AYas but the menace which flung
back
On him the torments of thy rack :
The fate thou didst so well fore-
see.
But would not to appease him tell;
And in thy silence was his sentence,
And in his soul a vain repentance.
And evil dread so ill dissembleil
That in his hand the lightnings trem-
bled.
Thy godlike crime was to be kind.
To render with thy precept less
The sum of human wretchedness.
And strengthen man with his own
mind ;
But baffled as thou wert from high,
Still in thy patient energy.
In the endurance, and repulse
Of thine impenetrable spirit,
Which earth and heaven could not
convulse,
A mighty lesson we inherit:
Thou art a symbol and a sign
To mortals of their fate and force;
Like thee, man is in part divine,
A troubled stream from a pure
source ;
And man in portions can foresee
His own funereal destiny ;
His wretcliedness, and liis resistance,
And Ills sad unallied existence :
To whicli his si^irit may opiDose
Itself — and equal to all -woes,
And a firm will, and a deep sense.
Which even in torture can descry
Its own concentered recompense,
Triumphant where it dares defy.
And making death a victory !
WHEN COLDNESS Jl'IiAPS THIS
SUFFERING CLAY.
When coldness wraps this suffering
clay,
Ah! whither strays the immortal
mind ?
It cannot die, it cannot stray,
But leaves its darkened dust be-
hind.
Then, unembodied, doth it trace
By steps each planet's heavenly
way ?
Or fill at once the realms of space,
A thing of eyes, that all survey ?
Eternal, boundless, undecayed,
A thought unseen, but seeing all,
All, all in earth, or skies displayed.
Shall it survey, shall it recall:
Each fainter trace that memory holds
80 darkly of departed years,
In one broad glance the soul beholds,
And all that was, at once appears.
Before Creation peopled earth.
Its eyes shall roll through chaos
back;
And where the f urtliest heaven had
birth.
The spirit trace its rising track,
And where the future mars or makes.
Its glance dilate o'er all to be.
While sun is quenched or system
breaks.
Fixed in its own eternity.
Above or Love, Hope, Hate, or Fear,
It lives all passionless and piire:
An age shall fleet like earthly year;
Its years as moments shall endure.
Away, away, without a wing.
O'er all, through all, its thoughts
shall fly;
A nameless and eternal thing.
Forgetting what it was to die.
SUN OF THE SLEEPLESS.
Sun of the sleepless ! melancholy star !
Whose tearful beam glows tremu-
lously far,
That show'st the darkness thou canst
not dispel,
How like art thou to joy remembered
well !
So gleams the past, the light of other
days,
Which shines, but warms not with
its powerless rays ;
A night-beam sorrow watches to be-
hold.
Distinct, but distant — clear — but
oh, how cold!
FARE THEE WELL.
Fare thee well! and if for ever,
Still for ever, fare tliee v^ell ;
Even though unforgiving, never
'Gainst thee shall my heart rebel.
AVould that breast were bared before
thee
Where thy head so oft hath lain.
While that placid sleep came o'er
thee.
Which thou ne'er canst know
again :
Would that breast, by thee glanced
over.
Every inmost thought could show!
Then thou wouldst at last discover
'Twas not well to siDurn it so.
Through the world for this commend
thee —
Though it smile upon the blow.
Even its praises must offend thee,
Founded on another's woe:
BYRON.
Though my many faults defaced me,
Could no other arm be found,
Than the one which once embraced
me.
To inflict a cureless wound '?
Yet, oh yet, thyself deceive not:
Love may sink by slow decay,
But by sudden wrench, believe not
Hearts can thus be torn away :
Still thine own its life retaineth —
Still must mine, though bleeding,
beat ;
And the undying thought which
paineth
Is — that we no more may meet.
These are words of deeper sorrow
Than the wail above the dead ;
Both shall live, but every morrow
Wake us from a widowed bed.
And when thou wouldst solace gather.
When our child's first accents
flow.
Wilt thou teach her to say "Father!"
Though his care she must forego ?
When her little hands shall press thee,
When her lip to thine is pressed,
Think of him whose prayer shall bless
thee,
Think of him thy love had blessed !
Should her lineaments resemble
Those thou never more mayst see.
Then thy heart will softly tremble
With a pulse yet true to me.
All my faults perchance thou know-
est.
All my madness none can know ;
All my hopes, where'er thou goest,
AVither, yet with thee they go.
Every feeling hath been*'shaken ;
Pride, which not a world could
bow,
Bows to thee — by thee forsaken,
Even my soul forsakes me now :
But 'tis done — all words are idle —
Words from me are vainer still;
But the thoughts we cannot bridle
Force their way without the will.
Fare thee well! — thus disunited,
Torn from eveiy nearer tie,
Seared in heart, and lone and blighted,
More than this I scarce can die.
SOXNET OX CHILL OX.
Eterxal spirit of the chainless
mind !
Brightest in dungeons, Liberty!
thou art,
For there thy habitation is the
heart —
The heart which love of thee alone
can bind ;
And when thy sons to fetters are
consigned —
To fetters, and the damj) vault's
dayless gloom,
Their country conquers with their
martyrdom.
And Freedom's fame finds wings on
every wind.
Chillon ! thy prison is a holy place.
And thy sad floor an altar — for
'twas trod.
Until his very steps have left a trace
Worn, as if thy cold pavement
were a sod.
By Bonnivard ! — May none those
marks efface ;
For they appeal from tyranny to God.
SHE WALKS TX BEAUTY.
She walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies :
And all that's best of dark and bright
Meets in her aspect and her eyes:
Thus mellowed to that tender light
Which heaven to gaudy day denies.
One shade the more, one ray the less,
Had half impaired the nameless
grace,
94
BYRON.
Which waves in every raven tress,
Or softly lightens o'er her face;
Where thoughts serenely sweet ex-
press,
How pure, how clear their dwelling-
place.
And on that cheek, and o'er that
brow,
So soft, so calm, yet eloquent,
The smiles that win, the tints that
glow,
But tell of days in goodness spent,
A mind at peace with all below,
A heart whose love is innocent!
INSCRIPTIOX
ox THE MONl'MENT OF THE AUTHOR'S
DOU BOATSWAIN.
When some proud son of man returns
to earth.
Unknown to glory, but upheld by
birth.
The sculptor's art exalts the pomp
of woe,
And storied urns record avIio rests
below ;
AVlien all is done, upon the tomb is
seen,
Xot what he was, but what he should
have been.
But the poor dog, in life the firmest
friend,
Tlie first to welcome, foremost to de-
fend.
Whose honest heart is still his mas-
ter's own,
Who labors, fights, lives, breathes for
him alone,
Unhonored falls, imnoticed all his
worth,
Denied in heaven the soul he held on
earth;
While man, vain insect! hopes to be
forgiven.
And claims himself a sole exclusive
heaven.
O man I thou feeble tenant of an
honi'.
Debased by slavery, or corrupt by
power,
Who knows thee well must quit thee
Avith disgust.
Degraded mass of animated dust!
Thy love is lust, thy friendship all a
cheat,
Thy smiles hypocrisy, tliy words de-
ceit!
By nature vile, ennobled but by name.
Each kindred brute might bid thee
blush for shame.
Ye ! who perchance behold this simple
urn,
Pass on — it honors none you wish
to mourn ;
To mark a friend's remains these
stones arise ;
I never knew but one — and here he
lies.
MAID OF ATHENS.
Maid of Athens, ere we part,
Give, oh, give me back my heart I
Or, since that has left my breast.
Keep it now, and take the rest !
Hear my vow before I go,
£ui(7 Hoi, eras aymru).*
By those tresses miconfined,
Wooed by each iEgean Avind ;
By those lids whose jetty fringe
Kiss thy soft cheek's blooming tinge;
By those wild eyes like the roe,
Sai»7 fiou, (TQj ayaTTui.
By that lip I long to taste;
By that zone-encircled waist;
By all the token-flowers that tell
AVhat words can never speak so well ;
By love's alternate joy and woe,
Tiir; /lov, od; ayairCi,
'Sla.id of Athens ! I am gone :
Think of me, sweet! when alone.
Though I fly to Istambol,
Athens holds my heart and soul :
Can I cease to love thee ? No !
Soil; fioTi, (7(5f aymrw.
* Z6e moil, sas agapo, .\fi/ life, I lore i/ou.
BYRON.
95
EPISTLE TO AUGUSTA.
My sister! my sweet sister! if a name
Dearer and purer were, it should l)e
thine;
Mountains and seas divide us, hut 1
claim
No tears, but tenderness to answer
mine :
(4o where I will, to me thou art the
same —
A loved regret which I would not re-
sign.
There yet are two things in my des-
tiny,—
A world to roam through, and a home
with thee.
The first were nothing — had I still
the last.
It were the haven of my happiness;
But other claims and other ties thou
hast,
And mine is not the wish to make
them less.
A strange doom is thy father's son's,
and past
Recalling, as it lies beyond redress;
IJeversed for him our grandsire'sfate
of yore, —
lie had no rest at sea, nor I on shore.
If my inheritance of storms hath
been
In other elements, and on the rocks
Of perils, overlooked or unforeseen,
I have sustained my share of worldly
shocks.
The fault was mine; nor do I seek to
screen,
My errors. with defensive paradox ;
I have been cimning in mine over-
throw.
The careful jiilot of my proper woe.
Mine were my faults, and mine be
their reward.
My whole life was a contest, since
the day
That gave me being, gave me that
which marred
The gift, — a fate, or will, that walked
astray ;
And I at times have foiuid the strug-
gle hard.
And thought of shaking off my bonds
of clay :
But now I fain would for a time sur-
vive.
If but to see what next can well ar-
rive.
Kingdoms and empires in my litth^
day
I have outlived, and yet I am not old ;
And when I look on this, the petty
spray
Of my own years of trouble, which
have rolled
Like a wild bay of breakers, melts
away ;
Something — I know not what — does
still uphold
A spirit of slight patience; — not in
vain.
Even for its own sake, do we pur-
chase pain.
Perhaps the workings of defiance stir
Within me — or perhaps a cold de-
spair.
Brought on when ills habitually re-
cur, —
Perhaps a kinder clime, or purer air.
( Fur even to this may change of soul
refer,
•Vnd with light armor we may learn
to bear,)
Have taught me a strange quiet;
which was not
The chief companion of a calmer lot.
I feel almost at times as I have felt
In happy childhood ; trees, and flow-
ers, and brooks.
Which do remember me of where I
dwelt
Ere my young mind was sacrificed to
books.
Come as of yore upon me, and can
melt
My heart with recognition of their
looks ;
And even at moments I think I could
see
Some living thing to love — but none
like thee.
96
BYRON.
Here are the Alpine landscapes which
create
A fund for contemplation; — to ad-
mire
Is a brief feeling of a trivial date:
But something worthier do such
scenes inspire:
Here to be lonely is not desolate,
For much I view ^^'hich I could most
desire,
And. above all, a lake I can behold
Lovelier, not dearer, than our own
of old.
that thou wert but with me! — but
I grow
The fool of my own wishes, and forget
The solitude which I have vaunted so
Has lost its praise in this but one re-
gret ;
There may be others which I less
may show; —
1 am not of the plaintive mood, and
yet
I feel an ebb in my philosophy.
And the tide rising in my altered eye.
I did remind thee of our own dear
lake.
By the old Hall which may be mine
no more.
Leman's is fair; but think not I for-
sake
The sweet remembrance of a dearer
shore:
Sad havoc Time must with my mem-
ory make
Ere that or tliou can fade these eyes
before ;
Though like all things which I have
loved, they are
Resigned for ever, or divided far.
The world is all before me ; but I ask
Of Nature that with which she will
comply —
It is but in her siunmer's sun to bask.
To mingle with the quiet of her sky,
To see her gentle face without a
mask.
And never gaze on it with apathy.
She was niy early friend, and now
shall be
My sister — till I look again on thee.
I can reduce all feelings but this one ;
And that I would not; — for at length
I see
Such scenes as those wherein my life
begun
The earliest — even the only paths
for me.
Had I but sooner learnt the crowd to
shun,
I had been better than I now can be ;
The passions which have torn me
would have slept ;
I had not suffered, and thou hadst
not wept.
With false Ambition what had I to do?
Little with Love, and least of all
with Fame;
And yet they came unsought, and
with me grew,
And made me all which they can
make — a name.
Yet this was not the end I did pursue;
Surely I once beheld a noljler aim.
But all is over — I am one the more
To baffled millions which have gone
before.
And for the future, this world's fu-
ture may
From me demand but little of my
care ;
I have outlived myself by many a day ;
Having survived so many things that
were ;
My years have been no slumber, but
the prey
Of ceaseless vigils; for I had the share
Of life which might have tilled a cen-
tury,
Before its fourth in time had passed
me by.
And for the remnant which may be
to come
I am content; and for the past I feel
Not thankless. — for within the
crowded sum
Of struggles, happiness at times
would steal.
And for the present, I would not be-
numb
My feelings farther. Nor shall I
conceal
BYRON.
97
That with all this I still can look
around.
And worship Nature with a thought
profound.
For thee, my own sweet sister, in thy
heart
1 know myself secure, as thou in mine ;
We were and are — 1 am, even as
thou art —
Beings who ne'er each other can re-
sign;
It is the same, together or apart,
From life's conmiencement to its
slow decline
We are entwined — let death come
slow or fast.
The tie which bound the first endures
the last.
[From The Giaour.]
THE FIB ST DAY OF DEATH.
He who hath bent him o'er the
dead
Ere the first day of death is fled.
The first dark day of nothingness.
The last of danger and distress,
(Before Decay's effacing fingers
Have swept the lines where beauty
lingers ) .
And marked the mild angelic air.
The rapture of repose that's there,
The fixed yet tender traits that
streak
The languor of the placid cheek.
And — but for that sad shrouded eye.
That fires not, wins not, weeps not
now.
And but for that chill changeless
brow.
Where cold Obstruction's apathy
Appals the gazing mourner's heart,
As if to him it could impart
The doom he dreads, yet dwells upon;
Yes, but for these and these alone.
Some moments, ay, one treacherous
hour.
He still might doubt the tyrant's
power ;
So fair, so calm, so softly sealed.
The first last look by death revealed !
[From The Giaour.']
LOVE.
Yes,
Love indeed is light from
heaven ;
A spark of that immortal fire
With angels shared, by Allah given,
To lift from earth our low desire.
Devotion wafts the mind above.
But heaven itself descends in love ;
A feeling from the Godhead caught.
To wean from self each sordid
thought ;
A ray of Him who formed the whole;
A glory circling round the soul !
[From The Dream.]
SLEEP.
Our life is twofold! Sleep hath its
own world,
A boundary between the things mis-
named
Death and existence: Sleep hath its
own world.
And a wide realm of wild reality.
And dreams in their development
have breath.
And tears, and tortures, and the
touch of joy;
They leave a weight upon our wak-
ing thoughts.
They take a weight from off our
waking toils.
They do divide our being; they be-
come
A portion of ourselves as of our time,
And look like heralds of eternity;
They pass like spirits of the past —
they speak
Like sibyls of the future ; they have
power —
The tyranny of pleasure and of pain ;
They make us what we were not —
what they will.
And shake us with the vision that's
gone by.
The dream of vanished shadows —
Are they so ?
Is not the past all shadow ? What
are they ?
98
BYRON.
Creations of the mind ? — The mind
can make
Substance, and people planets of its
own
With beings brighter than have been,
and give
A breath to form Avhich can outlive
all flesh.
I would recall a vision which I
dreamed
Perchance in sleep — for in itself a
thought,
A slumbering thought, is capable of
years.
And curdles a long life into one hour.
{From Don Juan.]
THE ISLES OF GREECE.
The isles of Greece, the isles of
Greece! [sung.
Where burning Sappho loved and
Where grew the arts of Mar and
peace, —
Where Delos rose and Phoebus
sprung !
Eternal summer gilds them yet,
But all, except their sun, is set.
The Scian and the Teian muse,
The hero's harp, the lover's lute.
Have found the fame your shores
refuse :
Their place of birth alone is mute
To sounds which echo further west
Than your sires' " Islands of the
Blest."
The moimtains look on Marathon —
And Marathon looks on the sea ;
And musing there an hour alone,
I dreamed that Greece might still
be free ;
For standing on the Persian's grave,
I could not deem myself a slave.
A king sat on the rocky lirow
Which looks o'er sea-born Salamis:
And ships, by thousands, lay below.
And men in nations ; — all were his !
He counted them at break of day —
And M'hen the sun set, where were
they ?
And where are they ? and where art
thou,
M^ country ? On thy voiceless shore
The heroic lay is timeless now —
The heroic bosom beats no more !
And must thy lyre, so long divine.
Degenerate into hands like mine ?
'Tis something, in the dearth of fame,
Though linked among a fettered
race,
To feel at least a patriot's shame.
Even as I sing, suffuse my face ;
For what is left the poet here ?
For Greeks a blush — for Greece a
tear.
,Must loe but weep o'er days more
blest ?
Must we but blush ? — Our fathers
bled.
Earth! render back from out thy
breast
A remnant of our Spartan dead !
Of the three hundred grant but three.
To make a new Thermopylaj !
What, silent still ? and silent all ?
Ah ! no ; — the voices of the dead
Sound like a distant torrent's fall,
And answer, "Let one living head.
But one arise, — we come, we come! "
'Tis but the living who are dumb.
In vain — in vain ; strike other
chords ;
Fill high the cup with Samian
wine !
Leave battles to the Turkish hordes,
And shed the blood of Scio's vine!
Hark ! rising to the ignoble call —
How answers each bold Bacchanal !
You have the Pyrrhic dance as yet.
Where is the Pyrrhic phalanx
gone?
Of two such lessons, why forget
The nobler and the manlier one ?
You have the letters Cadmus gave, —
Think ye he meant them for a slave ?
Fill high the bowl with Samian wine !
We will not think of themes like
these !
THE ISLES OF GREECE.
Page
It made Anacreon's song divine:
He served — but served Poly-
crates —
A tyrant ; but our masters then
Were still, at least, our countrymen.
The tyrant of the Chersonese
Was freedom's best and bravest
friend ;
That tyrant was Miltiades!
Oh! that the present hour would
lend
Another despot of the kind !
Such chains as his were sure to bind.
Fill high the bowl with Samian
wine !
On Suli's rock, and Parga's shore.
Exists the remnant of a line
Such as the Doric mothers bore ;
And there, perliaps, some seed is
sown.
The Heracleidan blood might own.
Trust not for freedom to the Franks —
They have a king who buys and
sells ;
In native swords, and native ranks,
The only hope of courage dwells :
But Turkisli force and Latin fraud
Would break your shield, however
broad.
Fill high the bowl with Samian
wine !
Our virgins dance beneath the
shade —
I see their glorious black eyes shine ;
But gazing on each glowing maid,
My own the burning tear-drop laves,
To think such breasts must suckle
slaves.
Place me on Sunium's marble steep.
Where nothing save the waves
and 1
May hear our mutual murnun-s sweep :
There, swan-like, let me sing and
die;
A land of slaves shall ne'er be mine —
Dash down yon cup of Samian
[ From the Prophecy of Dante.]
GENIUS.
Many are poets who have never
penned
Their inspiration, and perchance,
the best ;
They felt, and loved and died, but
would not lend
Their thoughts to meaner beings;
they compressed
The God within them, and rejoined
the stars
Unlaurelled upon earth, but far
more blessed
Than those who are degraded by the
jars
Of passion, and their frailties
linked to fame.
Conquerors of high renown, but
full of scars.
Many are poets, but without the
name ;
For Avhat is poesy but to create
From overf eeling good or ill ; and
aim
At an external life beyond our fate
And be the new Prometheus of
new men.
Bestowing fire from heaven, and
then, too late,
Finding the pleasure given repaid
with pain.
And vultures to the heart of the
bestower.
Who, having lavished his high
gift in vain
Lies chained to his lone rock by the
sea-shore !
So be it; we can bear. — But thus
all they
"Wliose intellect is an o'ermastering
power,
Wliich still recoils from its encum-
bering clay.
Or lightens it to spirit, whatsoe'er
The forms which their creation
may essay.
Are bards; the kindled marble's bust
may wear
More poesy upon its speaking
brow
Than aught less than the Homeric
100
BYRON.
One noble stroke with a whole life
may glow,
Or deify the canvas till it shine
With beauty so surpassing all be-
low,
That they who kneel to idols so di-
vine
Break no commandment, for high
heaven is there
Transfused, transfigurated : and
the line
Of poesy which peoples but the air
With thought and beings of our
thought reflected.
Can do no more : then let the artist
share
The palm ; he shares the peril, and
dejected
Faints o'er the labor unapproved
—Alas!
Despair and genius are too oft con-
nected.
{From Childe Harold.}
THE MISERY OF EXCESS.
TO INEZ.
Nay, smile not at my sullen brow,
Alas! I cannot smile again:
Yet Heaven avert that ever thou
Shouldst weep, and haply weep in
vain.
And dost thou ask, what secret woe
I bear, corroding joy and youth ?
And wilt thou vainly seek to know
A pang, even thou must fail to
soothe ?
It is not love, it is not hate.
Nor low ambition's honors lost,
That bids me loathe my present state,
And fly from all I prize the most!
It is that weariness which springs
From all I meet, or hear, or see ;
To me no pleasure Beauty brings :
Thine eyes have scarce a charm foi'
me.
It is that settled, ceaseless gloom
The fabled Hebrew wanderer bore;
That will not look beyond the tomb.
And cannot hope for rest before.
What exile from himself can flee ?
To zones, though more and more
remote.
Still, still pursues, where'er I be.
The blight of life — the demon
Thought.
Yet, others rapt in pleasure seem.
And taste of all that I forsake;
Oh ! may they still of transport
dream.
And ne'er, at least like me, awake!
Through many a clime 'tis mine to
go,
With many a retrospection curst;
And all my solace is to know.
What e'er betides, I've known the
worst.
What is that worst ? Nay, do not
ask —
In pity from the search forbear:
Smile on — nor venture to mimask
Man's heart, and view the Hell
that's there.
[From Childe Harold.]
APOSTROPHE TO THE OCEAX.
There is a pleasure in the pathless
woods.
There is a rapture on the lonely
shore.
There is society, where none intrudes.
By the deep sea, and music in its
roar:
I love not Man the less, but Nature
more.
From these our interviews, in which
I steal
From all I may be, or have been be-
fore.
To mingle Avith the Universe, and feel
What I can ne'er express, yet cannot
all conceal.
Roll on, thou deep and dark blue
Ocean — roll !
Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee
In vain;
Man marks the earth with ruin — his
control
Stops with the shore; — upon the
watery plain
The wrecks are all thy deed, nor doth
remain
A shadow of man's ravage, save his
own,
When, for a moment, like a drop of
rain,
He sinks into thy depths with bub-
bling groan.
Without a grave, uuknelled, uncof-
tined, and unknown.
The armaments which thunderstrike
the walls
Of rock-built cities, bidding nations
quake.
And monarclis tremble in their cap-
itals.
The oak leviathans, whose huge ribs
make
Their clay creator the vain title take
Of lord of thee, and arbiter of war;
These are thy toys, and, as the snowy
flake,
They melt into thy yeast of waves,
which mar
Alike the Armada's pride or spoils of
Trafalgar.
Thy shores are empires, changed in
all save thee —
Assyria, Greece, Eome, Carthage,
what are they ?
Thy waters waslied tliem power while
they were free.
And many a tyrant since ; their shores
obey
The stranger, slave, or savage; their
decay
Has dried up reahiis to deserts: —
not so thou; —
Unchangeable save to thy wild waves'
play —
Time writes no wrinkle on thine
azure brow —
Such as creation's dawn beheld, thou
rollest now.
Thou glorious mirror, where the Al-
mighty's form
Glasses itself in tempests; in all time.
Calm or convulsed — in breeze or
gale, or storm.
Icing the pole, or in the torrid clime
Dark-heaving ; — boundless, endless,
and sublime —
The image of eternity — the throne
Of the Invisible ; even from out thy
slime
The monsters of the deep are made :
each zone
Obeys thee: thou goest forth, dread,
fathomless, alone.
And I have loved thee. Ocean ! and
my joy [to be
Of youthful sports was on thy breast
Borne, like thy bubbles, onward:
from a boy
I wantoned with thy breakers — they
to me • (sea
Were a delight; and if the freshening
Made them a terror — 'twas a pleas-
ing fear.
For I was as it were a child of thee,
And, trusted to thy billows far and
near,
And laid my hand upon thy mane —
as I do here.
[From Childe Harold.']
CALM AND TEMPEST AT NIGHT
ON LAKE LEMAN {GENEVA).
Clear, placid Leman! thy con-
trasted lake.
With the wide world I dwelt in is a
thing
Which warns me, with its stillness,
to forsake [spring.
Earth's troubled waters for a purer
This quiet sail is as a noiseless Aving
To waft me from distraction ; once
I loved
Torn ocean's roar, but thy soft
murmuring
Sounds sweet as if a sister's voice
reproved.
That I with stern delights should e'er
have been so moved.
102
BYRON.
It is the hush of night, and all be-
tween
Thy margin and the mountains,
dusk, yet clear,
Mellowed and mingling, yet dis-
tinctly seen,
Save darkened Jura, whose capt
heights appear
Precipitously steep; and drawing
near
There breathes a living fragrance
from tlie shore.
Of flowers yet fresh with childhood ;
on the ear
Drops the light drip of the sus-
pended oar.
Or chirps the grasshopper one good-
night carol more.
He is an evening reveller who
makes
His life an infancy, and sings his
till;
At intervals, some bird from out
the brakes
Starts into voice a moment, then is
still.
There seems a floating whisper on
the hill,
But that is fancy, for the starlight
dews
All silently their tears of love instil,
Weeping themselves away, till they
infuse
Deep into Nature's breast the spirit
of Iier hues.
Ye stars! which are the poetry of
heaven,
If in your bright leaves we would
read the fate
Of men and empires, — 'tis to be
forgiven,
That in" our aspirations to be great,
Our destinies o'erleap their mortal
state,
And claim a kindred with you ; for
ye are
A beauty, and a mystery, and create
In us such love and reverence from
afar.
That fortune, fame, power, life, have
named themselves a star.
All heaven and earth are still —
though not in sleep,
But breathless, as we grow when
feeling most;
And silent, as we stand in thoughts
too deep : —
All heaven and earth are still : —
From the high host
Of stars, to the lulled lake and
mountain-coast.
All is concentred in a life intense.
Where not a beam, nor air, nor leaf
is lost,
But hath a part of being, and a
sense
Of that which is of all Creator and
defence.
Then stirs the feeling infinite, so
felt
In solitude, where we are least
alone ;
A truth, which through our being,
then doth melt.
And purifies from self : it is a tone.
The soul and source of music, which
makes known
Eternal harmony, and sheds a
charm.
Like to the fabled Cytherea's stone.
Binding all things with beauty ; —
'twould disarm
The spectre Death, had he substantial
power to harm.
Not vainly did the early Persian
make
His altar the high places and the
peak
Of earth-o'ergazing mountains, and
thus take
A fit and unwalled temple, there to
seek
The Spirit in whose honor shrines
are weak,
Upreared of human hands. Come,
and compare
Columns and idol-dwellings, Goth
or Greek,
With Nature's realms of worship,
earth and air.
Nor fix on fond abodes to circum-
scribe thy prayer!
BYRON.
103
The sky is changed '? — and such a
change! O night,
And storm, and darkness, ye are
wondrous strong,
Yet lovely in your strength, as is
the light
Of a darkeye in woman ! Far along
From peak to peak, the rattling
crags among,
Leaps the live thunder! Not froin
one lone cloud.
But evei-y mountain now hath
found a tongue,
And Jura answers, through her
misty shroud.
Back to the joyous Alps, who call to
her aloud !
And this is in the night : — Most
glorious night !
Thou wert not sent for slumber ! let
me be
A sharer in thy fierce and far de-
light. —
A portion of the tempest and of
thee!
How the lit lake shines, a phos-
phoric sea.
And the big rain comes dancing to
the earth!
And now again 'tis black, — and
now, the glee
Of the loud hills shakes with its
mountain-mirth,
As if they did rejoice o'er a young
earthquake's birth.
Sky, mountains, river, winds, lake,
lightnings! ye!
With night, and clouds, and thun-
der, and a soul
To make these felt, and feeling,
well may be
Things that have made me watch-
ful ; the far roll
Of your departing voices, is the
knoll
Of what in me is sleepless, — if I
rest. goal ?
But where of ye, O tempests, is the
Are ye like those within the human
breast ?
Or do ye find, at length, like eagles,
some high nest!
Could I embody and unbosom now
That which is most within me, —
could I wreak
My thoughts upon expression, and
thus throw
Soul, heart, mind, passions, feel-
ings, strong or weak.
All that I would have sought, and
all I seek.
Bear, know, feel, and yet breathe —
into one word.
And that one word were light-
ning, I would speak;
But as it is I live and die imheard.
With a most voiceless thought
sheathing it as a sword.
iFrom Childe Harold.]
BYRON-S REMARKABLE PROPHECY.
And if my voice break forth, 'tis not
that now
I shrink from what is suffered : let
him speak
"Wlio hath beheld decline upon my
brow,
Or seen my mind's convulsion leave
it weak ;
But in this page a record will I seek.
Not in the air shall these my words
disperse.
Though 1 be ashes ; a far hour shall
wreak [verse.
The deep prophetic fulness of this
And pile on human heads the momi-
tain of my curse !
That curse shall be Forgiveness. —
Have I not —
Hear me, my mother Earth! behold
it. Heaven ! —
Have I not had to wrestle with my
lot?
Have I not suffered things to be for-
given ?
Have I not had my brain seared, my
heart riven,
Hopes sapped, name blighted, Life's
life lied away ?
And only not to desperation driven,
Because not altogether of such clay
As rots into the souls of those whom
I survey.
104
BYRON.
From mighty wrongs to petty perfidy
Have I not seen what human things
could do ?
From the loud roar of foaming cal-
umny
To the small whisper of the as paltry
few,
And subtler venom of the reptile
crew,
The Janus glance of whose signifi-
cant eye,
Learning to lie with silence, would
seem true.
And without utterance, save the
shrug or sigh,
Deal round to happy fools its speech-
less obloquy.
But I have lived, and have not lived
in vain :
My mind may lose its force, my blood
its tire.
And my frame perish even in con-
quering pain;
But there is that within me that shall
tire
Torture and Time, and breathe when
I expire.
Something vmearthly, which they
deem not of
Like the remembered tone of a mute
lyre.
Shall on their softened spirits sink,
and move
In hearts all rocky now the late re-
morse of love.
[From Chihle Harold.-]
ONE PRESENCE WANTING.
The castled crag of Drachenfels
FroM'ns o'er the wide and winding
Rhine,
WTiose breast of waters broadly swells
Between the banks which bear the
vine,
And hills all rich with blossomed
trees.
And fields which promise corn and
wine.
And scattered cities crowning these.
Whose far white walls along them
shine,
Have strewed a scene, which I should
see
With double joy wert thou with me.
And peasant girls, with deep-blue
eyes.
And hands which offer early flowers,
Walk smiling o'er this paradise;
Above, the frequent feudal towers
Through green leaves lift their walls
of gray
And many a rock which steeply low-
ers,
And noble arch in proud decay,
Look o'er this vale of vintage-bowers ;
13ut one thing want these banks of
Ehine, —
Thy gentle hand to clasp in mine !
I send the lilies given to me ;
Though long before thy hand they
touch,
I know that they must withered
be.
But yet reject them not as such :
For I have cherished them as dear
Because they yet may meet thine
eye.
And guide thy soul to mine even
here.
When thou behold'st them drooping
nigh.
And knowest them gathered by the
Rhine,
And offered from my heart to thine.
The river nobly foams and flows.
The charm of this enchanted ground.
And all its thousand turns disclose
Some fresher beauty varying roimd :
The haughtiest breast its wish might
bound
Through life to dwell delighted
here ;
Nor could on earth a spot be found
To nature and to me so dear.
Could thy dear eyes in following
mine
Still sweeten more these banks of
Rhine!
BYEON.
105
\_From Childe Harold.]
GREE CE,
And yet how lovely in thine age of
woe,
Land of lost gods and godlike men !
art thou !
Thy vales of evergreen, thy hills of
snow ;
Proclaim thee nature's varied fa-
vorite now ;
Thy fanes, thy temples to thy sur-
face bow,
Commingling slowly with heroic
earth,
Broke by the share of eveiy rustic
plough :
So perish monuments of mortal
birth.
So perish all in turn, save well-re-
corded worth;
Save where some solitary column
mourns
Above its i^rostrate brethren of the
cave;
Save where Tritonia's airy shrine
adorns
Colonna's cliff, and gleams along
the wave ;
Save o'er some warrior's half-for-
gotten grave.
Where the gray stones and unmo-
lested grass
Ages, but not oblivion, feebly brave.
Where strangers only, not regard-
less pass.
Lingering like me, perchance, to gaze,
and sish " Alas! "
Yet are thy skies as blue, thy crags
as wild :
Sweet are thy groves, and verdant
are thy fields.
Thine olive ripe as when Minerva
smiled,
And still his honeyed wealth Hy-
mettus yields ;
There the blithe bee his fragrant
fortress builds.
The freeborn wanderer of the
mountain air:
Apollo still thy long, long summer
gilds.
Still in his beam Mendeli's marbles
glare
Art, Glory, Freedom fail, but Nature
still is fair.
Where'er we tread 'tis haunted,
holy ground ;
Xo earth of thine is lost in vulgar
mould.
But one vast realm of wonder
spreads around,
And all the Muse's tales seem truly
told, [behold
Till the sense aches with gazing to
The scenes our earliest dreams have
dwelt upon:
Each hill and dale, each deepening
glen and wold
Defies the power which crushed thy
temples gone :
Age shakes Athena' s tower, but spares
gray Marathon.
[From Childe Harold.]
APOSTROPHE TO ADA, THE
POET'S DAUGHTER.
My daughter! with thy name this
song begun —
My daughter! with thy name thus
much shall end —
I see thee not, — I hear thee not, —
but none
Can be so wrapped in thee; thou
art the friend
To whom the shadows of far years
extend ;
Albeit my brow thou never shouldst
behold,
My voice shall with thy future vis-
ions blend.
And reach into thy heart, — when
mine is cold,
A token and a tone, even from thy
father's mould.
To aid thy mind's development, —
to watch
Thy dawn of little joys, — to sit
and see
Almost thy very growth, — to view
thee catch
Knowledge of objects, — wonders
yet to thee !
To hold thee lightly on a gentle
knee.
And print on thy soft cheek a par-
ent's kiss, —
This, it should seem, was not re-
served for me;
Yet this was in my natm^e, — as it
is,
I know not what is there, yet some-
thing like to this.
Yet, though dull hate, as duty
should be taught,
I know that thou wilt love me;
though my name
Should be shut from thee, as a spell
still fraught
With desolation, — and a broken
claim:
Though the grave closed between
us, 'twere the same.
I know that thou wilt love me;
though to drain
My blood from out thy being were
an aim.
And an attainment, — all would be
in vain, —
Still thou wouldst love me, still that
more than life retain.
The child of love, — though born
in bitterness,
And nurtured in convulsion. Of
thy sire
These were the elements, — and
thine no less.
As yet such are around thee, — but
thy fire
Shall be more tempered, and thy
hope far higher.
Sweet be thy cradled slumbers!
O'er the sea,
And from the mountains where I
now respire.
Fain would I waft such blessing
upon thee,
As, with a sigh, I deem thou mightst
have been to me !
{From Chitde Harold.]
WATERLOO.
There was a sound of revelry by
night,
And Belgium's capital had gath-
ered then
Her beauty and her chivalry, and
bright
The lamps shone o'er fair women
and brave men;
A thousand hearts beat happily;
and when
Music arose with its voluptuous
swell.
Soft eyes looked love, to eyes which
spake again,
And all went merry as a marriage-
bell;
But hush ! hark ! a deep sound strikes
like a rising knell !
Did ye not hear it? — No: 'twas
but the wind.
Or tlie car rattling o'er the stony
street ;
On with the dance ! let joy be un-
confined ;
No sleep till morn, when Youth and
Pleasure meet
To chase the glowing hours with
flying feet —
But, hark ! — that heavy sound
breaks in once more.
As if the clouds its echo v/ould re-
peat;
And nearer, clearer, deadlier than
before !
Arm! arm! it is — it is — the can-
non's opening roar!
And there was mounting in hot
haste : the steed.
The mustering stjuadron, and the
clattering car.
Went pouring forward with impet-
uous speed.
And swiftly forming in the ranks
of war;
And the deep thunder peal on peal
afar ;
And near, the beat of the alarming
drum
BYRON.
107
Roused up the soldier ere the morn-
ing star;
While thronged the citizens with
terror dumb,
Or whispering with white lips "The
foe! They come! they come!"
And Ardennes waves above them
her green leaves,
Dewy with nature's tear-drops, as
they pass,
Grieving, if aught inanimate e'er
grieves.
Over the unreturning brave, — alas !
Ere evening to be trodden like the
grass
Which now beneath them, but
above shall grow
In its next verdiu-e, when this fiery
mass
Of living valor, rolling on the foe.
And burning with high hope, shall
moulder cold and low.
Last noon beheld them full of lustv
life.
Last eve in beauty's circle proudly
gay,
The midnight brought the signal
sound of strife, "
The morn the marshalling in arms,
— the day
Battle's magnificently-stern array!
The thunder-clouds close o'er it,
which when rent
The earth is covered thick with
other clay,
Wliich her own clay shall cover,
heaped and pent.
Rider and horse, — friend, foe, — in
one red burial blent!
ON COMPLETING MY THIRTY-
SIXTH YEAR.
[His last verses. ]
'Tis time this heart should be mi-
moved.
Since others it has ceased to move:
Yet, though I cannot be beloved.
Still let me love:
My days are in the yellow leaf;
The flowers and fruits of love are
gone ;
The worm, the canker, and the grief
Are mine alone !
The fire that on my bosom preys
Is lone as some volcanic isle;
No torch is kindled at its blaze —
A fimeral pile.
The hope, the fear, the jealous care.
The exalted portion of the pain
And power of love, I cannot share.
But wear the chain.
But 'tis not thus — and 'tis not /(ere —
Such thoughts should shake my
soul, nor now.
Where glory decks the hero's bier.
Or binds his brow.
The sword, the banner and the
field.
Glory and Greece, aroimd me see !
The Spartan, borne upon his shield,
Was not more free.
Awake ! (not Greece — she is awake ! )
Awake, my spirit! Think through
li'hom
Thy life-blood tracks Its parent lake,
And then strike home !
Tread those reviving passions down.
Unworthy manhood ! — unto thee
Indifferent should the smile or frown
Of beauty be.
If thou regrett'st thy youth, rclnj
live ?
The land of honorable death
Is here: — up to the field, and give
Away thy breath !
Seek out — less often sought than
found —
A soldier's grave, for thee the best;
Then look around, and choose thy
ground.
And take thy rest.
Thomas Campbell.
HALLOWED GROUND.
What's hallowed ground '? Has
earth a clod
Its Maker meant not should be trod
By man, the image of his God,
Erect and free,
Unscourged by Superstition's rod,
To bow the knee ?
That's hallowed ground — where,
mourned, and missed.
The lips repose our love has kissed: —
But Where's their memory's mansion?
Is't
Yon churchyard's bowers!
No! in ourselves their souls exist,
A part of ours.
A kiss can consecrate the ground
Where mated hearts are mutual
bound : [wound,
The spot where love's first links were
That ne'er are riven.
Is hallowed down to earth's profound.
And up to Heaven !
For time makes all but true love old ;
The burning thoughts that then were
told
Run molten still in memory's mould;
And will not cool,
Until the heart itself be cold
In Lethe's pool.
AVhat hallows ground where heroes
sleep ?
'Tis not the sculptured piles you
heap I
In dews that heavens far distant weep
Their turf may bloom ;
Or genii twine beneath the deep
Their coral tomb :
But strew his ashes to the wind
Whose sword or voice has served
mankind —
And is he dead, whose glorious mind
Lifts thine on high ? —
To live in hearts we leave behind,
Is not to die.
Is't death to fall for Freedom's right ?
He's dead alone that lacks her light!
And murder sullies in Heaven's sight
The sword he draws : —
What can alone ennoble fight ? —
A noble cause !
Give that ! and welcome War to brace
Her drums! and rend Heaven's reek-
ing space !
The colors planted face to face,
The charging cheer, —
Though Death's pale horse lead on
the chase, —
Shall still be dear.
And place our trophies where men
kneel
To Heaven! — but Heaven rebukes
my zeal !
The cause of Truth and human weal,
O God above !
Transfer it from the s^\ord's appeal
To Peace and Love.
Peace ! Love ! the cherubim that join
Their spread wings o'er Devotion's
shrine,
Prayers sound in vain, and temjiles
shine,
AVhere they are not;
The heart alone can make divine
Religion's spot.
To incantations dost thou trust.
And pompous rights in domes au-
gust ?
See mouldering stones and metal's
rust
Belie the vamit.
That men can bless one pile of dust
With chime or chant.
The ticking wood-worm mocks thee,
man !
The temples — creeds themselves,
grow wan!
But there's a dome of nobler span,
A temple given
Thy faith, that bigots dare not ban —
Its space is Heaven !
CAMPBELL.
109
Jts roof star-pictured Nature's ceiling,
Where trancing the rapt spirit's
feeling,
And God himself to man revealing,
The harmonious spheres
Make music, though imheard their
pealing
By mortal ears.
Fair stars ! are not your beings pure ?
Can sin, can death your worlds ob-
scure ?
Else why so swell the thouglitsat your
Aspect above '?
Ye must be Heavens that make us
sure
Of heavenly love !
And in your harmony sublime
I read the doom of distant time :
That man's regenerate soul from
crime
Shall yet be drawn,
And reason on his mortal clime
Immortal dawn.
What's hallowed ground ? 'Tis what
gives birth
To sacred thoughts in souls of
worth ! —
Peace! Independence! Trutli! go
forth
Earth's compass round;
And your high priesthood shall make
earth
All hallowed ground.
THE LAST MAN.
All worldly shapes shall melt in
gloom,
The "sun himself must die.
Before this mortal shall assume
Its immortality !
I saw a vision in my sleep,
That gave my spirit strength to
sweep
Adown the gulf of Time !
I saw the last of human mould.
That shall Creation's death behold,
As Adam saw her prime!
The Sun's eye had a sickly glare,
The Earth with age was wan,
The skeletons of nations were
Around that lonely man!
Some had expired in flight, — the
brands
Still rusted in their bony hands;
In plague and famine some!
Earth's cities had no sound nor tread,
And ships were drifting witli the dead
To shores where all was dumb !
Yet, prophet-like, that lone one stood,
With dauntless words and high,
That shook the sere leaves from the
wood
As if a storm passed by.
Saying, " We are twins in death,
proud Sun,
Thy face is cold, thy race is run,
'Tis Mercy bids thee go;
For thou ten thousand thousand years
Hast seen the tide of human tears,
That shall no longer flow.
"What though beneath thee man put
forth
His pomp, his pride, his skill ;
And arts that made tire, flood, and
earth,
The vassals of the will ? —
Yet mourn I not thy parted sway.
Thou dim discrowned king of day;
For all these trophied arts
And triumplis that beneath thee
sprang,
Healed not a passion or a pang
Entailed on human liearts.
" Go, let oblivion's curtain fall
Upon the stage of men.
Nor with thy rising beams recall
Life's tragedy again.
Its piteous pageants bring not back.
Nor waken flesh, upon the rack
Of pain anew to. writhe;
Stretched in disease's shapes abhorred
Or mown in battle by the sword,
Like grass beneath the scythe.
" Even I am weary in yon skies
To watch thy fading fire;
Test of all sumless agonies,
Behold not me expire.
"My lips that speak thy dirge of
death —
Their rounded gasp and gurgling
breath
To see thou shalt not boast.
The eclipse of Nature spreads my
pall, —
The majesty of darkness shall
Receive my parting ghost !
" This spirit shall return to Him
Who gave its heavenly spark:
Yet think not, Sun, it shall l)e dim
When thou thyself art dark !
No! it shall live again and shine
In bliss unknown "to beams of thine,
By Him recalled to breath,
Who captive led captivity.
Who robbed the grave of Victoiy, —
And took the siting from Death !
" Go, Sun, while Mercy holds me up
On Nature's awful waste
To drink this last and bitter cup
Of grief that man shall taste —
Go, tell the night that hides thy face.
Thou saw'st the last of Adam's race,
On Earth's sepulchral clod.
The darkening univei-se defy
To quench his Immortality,
Or shake his trust in God ! "
YE MARINERS OF ENGLAND.
A NAVAL ODE.
Ye Mariners of England !
That guard our native seas;
Whose flag has braved a thousand
years,
The battle and the breeze !
Your glorious standard launch again
To match another foe !
And sweep through the deep.
While the stormy winds do blow:
While the battle rages loud and long.
And the stormy winds do blow.
The spirits of your fathers
Shall start from every wave !
For the deck it was their field of fame,
And ocean was their grave ;
Where Blake and mighty Nelson fell,
Your manly hearts shall glow.
As ye sweep through the deep.
While the stormy winds do blow;
While the battle rages loud and long,
And the stormy winds do blow.
Britannia needs no bulwarks,
No towers along the steep;
Her march is o'er the mountain-
waves,
Her home is on the deep.
With thunders from her native oak.
She quells the floods below —
As they roar on the shore.
When the stormy winds do blow;
When the battle rages loud and long,
And the stormy winds do blow.
The meteor flag of England
Shall yet terrific burn ;
Till danger's troubled night depart,
And the star of peace return.
Then, then, ye ocean warriors!
Our song and feast shall flow
To the fame of your name.
When the storm has ceased to blow ;
W^hen the fiery fight is heard no more
And the storm has ceased to blow.
HOW DELICIOUS IS THE WIN-
NING.
How delicious is the winning
Of a kiss at love's beginning.
When two mutual hearts are sighing
For the knot there's no untying!
Yet, remember, 'midst your wooing.
Love has bliss, but love has ruing;
Other smiles may make you fickle.
Tears for other charms may trickle.
Love he comes, and Love he tarries,
Just as fate or fancy carries ;
Longest stays, Avhen sorest chidden;
Laughs and flies, when pressed and
bidden.
Bind the sea to slumber stilly,
Bind its odor to the lily,
Bind the aspen ne'er to quiver,
Then bind Love to last for ever !
CAMPBELL.
Ill
Love's a fire that needs renewal
Of fresh beauty for its fuel ;
Love's wing moults when caged and
captured,
Only free, he soars enraptured.
Can you keep the bee from ranging,
Or tlie ring-dove's neck from chang-
ing?
No! nor fettered Love from dying
In the knot there's no untying.
LORD UL LIN'S DAUGHTER.
A CHIEFTAIN, to the Highlands
bound.
Cries, " Boatman, do not tarry!
And I'll give thee a silver pound
To row us o'er the ferry."
" Now who be ye, would cross Loch-
gyle.
This dark and stormy water ? "
" O, I'm the chief of Ulva's isle,
And this Lord Ullin's daughter,
"And fast before her father's men
Three days we've fled together.
For should he find vis in the glen,
My blood would stain the heather.
" His horsemen hard behind us ride;
Should they our steps discover.
Then who will cheer my bonny bride
When they have slain her lover ? "
Outspoke the hardy Highland wight,
" I'll go, my chief — I'm ready, —
It is not for your silver bright;
But for your winsome lady :
"And by my word ! the bonny bird
In danger shall not tarry :
So though the waves are raging white,
I'll row you o'er the ferry."
By this the storm grew loud apace.
The water-wraith was shrieking;
And in the scowl of heaven each face
Grew dark as they were speaking.
But still as wilder blew the wind.
And as the night grew drearer,
Adown the glenrode armed men,
Their trampling sounded nearer.
" O haste thee, haste! " the lady cries,
' ' Though tempests round us gather ;
I'll meet the raging of the skies,
But not an angry father." —
The boat has left a stonny land,
A stormy sea befoi'e her,
When, oh! too strong for human
hand.
The tempest gathered o'er her.
And still they rowed amidst the roar
Of waters fast prevailing;
Lord Ullin reached that fatal shore;
His Avrath was changed to wailing.
For sore dismayed, through storm
and shade.
His child he did discover;
One lovely hand she stretched for aid.
And one was round her lover.
"Comeback! comeback!" he cried
in grief,
" Across this stormy water:
And 1"11 forgive your Highland chief.
My daughter! — O my'daughter ! "
'Twas vain: the loud waves lashed
the shore,
Return or aid preventing: —
The waters wild went o'er his child.
And he was left lamenting.
FIELD FLOWERS.
Ye field flowers! the gardens eclipse
you, 'tis true.
Yet, wildings of Nature, I dote upon
you,
For ye waft me to summers of old.
When the earth teemed around me
with fairy delight,
And when daisies and buttercups
gladdened my sight,
Like treasures of silver and gold.
I love you for lulling me back into
dreams
Of the blue Highland mountains and
echoing streams,
And of birchen glades breathing
their balm,
While the deer was seen glancing in
sunshine remote,
And the deep mellow crush of the
wood-pigeon's note
Made music that sweetened the
calm.
Xot a pastoral song has a pleasanter
tune
Than ye speak to my heart, little
wildings of June:
Of old ruinous castles ye tell.
Where I thought it delightful your
beauties to find,
When the magic of Nature first
breathed on my mind,
And your blossoms were part of her
spell.
Even now what affections the violet
awakes ;
What loved little islands, twice seen
in their lakes.
Can the wild water-lily restore;
What landscapes I read in the prim-
rose's looks,
And what pictures of pebbled and
minnowy brooks.
In the vetches that tangled their
shore.
Earth's cultureless buds, to my heart
ye were dear.
Ere the fever of passion, or ague of fear
Had scathed ray existence's bloom;
Once I welcome you more, in life's
passionless stage,
With the visions of youth to revisit
my age, [tomb.
And I wisli you to grow on my
HOHENLINDEHf.
Ox Linden, when the sun was low.
All bloodless lay the untrodden snow.
And dark as winter was the flow
Of Iser rolling rapidly.
But Linden saw another sight.
When the drum beat at dead of night,
Connnanding fires of death to light
The darkness of her scenery.
By torch and trumpet fast arrayed,
Each horseman drew his battle-blade.
And furious every charger neighed.
To join the dreadful reveliy.
Then shook the hills with thunder
riven,
Then rushed the steed to battle
driven.
And louder than the bolts of heaven
Far flashed the red artillery.
But redder yet that light shall glow
On Linden's hills of stained snow.
And bloodier yet the torrent flow
Of Iser, rolling rapidly.
'Tis morn, but scarce yon level sun
Can pierce the war-clouds rolling dun,
Where furious Frank and fiery Hun,
Shout in their sulphurous canopy.
The combat deepens. On ! ye brave,
Who rush to glory, or the grave !
Wave, Mimich ! all thy banners wave,
And charge with all thy chivalry !
Few, few shall part where many meet !
The snow shall be their winding-
sheet !
And every turf beneath their feet
Shall be a soldier's sepulchre.
EXILE OF ERIN.
There came to the beach a poor
exile of Erin,
The dew on his thin robe was heavy
and chill ;
For his country he sighed, when at
twilight repairing
To wander alone by the wind-beaten
hill.
But the day-star attracted his eye's
sad devotion.
For it rose o'er his own native isle of
the ocean,
CAMPBELL.
n\
Where once in the fire of his youthful
emotion,
He sang the bold anthem of Erin
go bragh !
"Sad is my fate!" said the heart-
brolien stranger;
" The wild deer and wolf to a covert
can flee,
But I have no refuge from famine
and danger,
A home and a country remain not
to me.
Never again, in the green sunny bow-
ers,
Where my forefathers lived, shall I
spend the sweet hours.
Or cover my harp with the wild-
woven flowers.
And strilve to the numbers of Erin
go bragh!
"Erin, my country! though sad and
forsalien,
In dreams I revisit thy sea-beaten
shore ;
But, alas! in a far foreign land I
awaken.
And sigh for the friends who can
meet me no more! [me
O cruel fate ! wilt thou never replace
In a mansion of peace — where no
perils can chase me ?
Never again shall my brothers em-
brace me ?
They died to defend me, or lived to
deplore !
"Where is ray cabin-door, fast by
the wild wood ?
Sisters and sire, did ye weep for its
fall?
Where is the mother that looked on
my childhood ?
And where is the bosom-friend,
dearer than all ?
Oh, my sad heart! long abandoned
by pleasure,
Why did it dote on a fast-fading
treasure ?
Tears, like the rain drop, may fall
witliout measure.
But rapture and beauty they can
not recall.
"Yet all its sad recollections sup-
pressing.
One dying wish my lone bosom can
draw :
Erin! an exile bequeathes thee this
blessing!
Land of my forefathers ! Erin go
bragh !
Buried and cold when my heart stills
her motion,
Green be thy fields, — sweetest isle of
the ocean !
And thy harp-striking bards sing
aloud with devotion, —
Erin mavournin — Erin go bragh ! " *
TO THE RAINBOW.
Triumphal arch, that fiU'st the sky
When storms prepare to part !
I ask not proud Philosophy
To teach me what thou art —
Still seem, as to my childhood's sight,
A midway station given
For happy spirits to alight
Betwixt the earth and heaven.
Can all that Optics teach, unfold
Thy form to please me so.
As when 1 dreamed of gems and gold
Hid in thy radiant bow ?
When Science from Creation's face
Enchantment's veil withdraws.
What lovely visions yield their place
To cold material laws !
And yet, fair bow, no fabling dreams,
But words of the Most High,
Have told why first thy robe of
beams
Was woven in the sky.
When o'er the green, undeluged earth
Heaven's covenant thou didst
shine,
How came the world's gray fathers
forth
To watch thy sacred sign !
♦ Ireland my darling— Ireland forever.
And when its yellow lustre smiled
O'er mountains yet untrod,
Each mother held aloft her child
To bless the bow of God.
Methinks, thy jubilee to keep,
The first-made anthem rang,
On earth delivered from the deep,
And the first poet sang.
Nor ever shall the Muse's eye
Unraptured greet thy beam :
Theme of primeval prophecy,
Be still the prophet's theme!
The earth to thee her incense yields,
The lark thy welcome sings,
When glittering in the freshened
fields
The snowy mushroom springs.
How glorious is thy girdle cast
O'er mountain, tower and town,
Or mirrored in the ocean vast,
A thousand fathoms down !
As fresh in yon horizon dark.
As young thy beauties seem,
As when the eagle from the ark
First sported in thy beam.
For, faithful to its sacred page.
Heaven still rebuilds thy span,
Nor lets the type grow pale with age
That first spoke peace to man.
THE RIVER OF LIFE.
The more we live, more brief appear
Our life's succeeding stages:
A day to childhood seems a year.
And years like passing ages.
The gladsome current of our youth.
Ere passion yet disorders,
Steals lingering like a river smooth
Along its grassy borders.
But as the careworn cheek grows wan,
And sorrow's shafts fly thicker,
Ye stars, that measure" life to man.
Why seem your courses quicker ?
When joys have lost their bloom and
breath,
And life itself is vapid,
Why, as we reach the Falls of Death,
Feel we its tide more rapid ?
It may be strange — yet who would
change
Time's course to slower speeding,
When one by one our friends have
gone
And left our bosoms bleeding ?
Heaven gives our years of fading
strength
Indemnifying fleetness ;
And those of youth, a seeming
length,
Proportioned to their sweetness.
BATTLE OF THE BALTIC.
Of Nelson and the North,
Sing the glorious day's renown,
When to battle fierce came forth
All the might of Denmark's crowTi,
And her arms along the deep proudly
shone ;
By each gun the lighted brand.
In a bold determined hand ;
And the prince of all the land
Led them on.
Like leviathans afloat,
Lay their bulwarks on the brine;
While the sign of battle flew
On the lofty British line:
It was ten of April morn by the chime :
As they drifted on their path,
There was silence deep as death ;
And the boldest held his breath,
For a time.
But the might of England flushed
To anticipate the scene ;
And her van the fleeter rushed
O'er the deadly space between.
"Hearts of oak! " our captain cried,
^\•hen each gun
From its adamantine lips
Spread a death-shade round the ships,
Like the hurricane eclipse
Of the sun.
WA
CAMPBELL.
115
Again! again! again!
Anil the havoc did not slack,
Till a feeble cheer the Dane
To our cheering sent us back :
Their shots along the deep slowly
boom;
Then ceased — and all is wail,
As they strike the shattered sail ;
Or, in conflagration pale,
Light the gloom.
Out spoke the victor then,
As he hailed them o'er the wave;
" Ye are brothers! ye are men!
And we conquer but to save : —
So peace instead of death let us
bring;
But yield, proud foe, thy fleet.
With the crew, at England's feet,
And make submission meet
To our king."
Then Denmark blessed our chief,
That he gave her woimds repose ;
And the sounds of joy and grief
From her people wildly rose.
As Death withdrew his shades from
the day ;
While the sun looked smiling bright
O'er a wide and woful sight,
Where the fires of funeral light
Died away.
Now joy, old England, raise
For the tidings of thy might,
By the festal cities' blaze.
Whilst the wine-cup shines in light!
And yet amidst that joy and uproar.
Let us think of them that sleep.
Full many a fathom deep,
By thy wild and stormy steep,
Elsinoi'e I
Brave hearts! to Britain's pride
Once so faithful and so true.
On the deck of fame that died
With the gallant, good Riou :
Soft sigh the winds of heaven o'er
their grave !
While the billow mournful rolls.
And the mermaid's song condoles,
Singing glory to the souls
Of the'^l:)rave!
SONG.
Eakl March looked on his dying
child.
And smit with grief to view her —
" The youth," he cried, " whom I ex-
iled.
Shall be restored to woo her."
She's at the window many an hour
His coming to discover:
And he looks up to Ellen's bower.
And she looks on her lover —
But ah ! so pale he knew her not.
Though her snlile on him was
dwelling,
" And am I then forgot — forgot ? "
It broke the heart of Ellen.
In vain he weeps, in vain he sighs.
Her cheek is cold as ashes;
Nor love's own kiss shall wake those
eyes
To lift their silken lashes.
TRIBUTE TO VICTORIA.
Victoria's sceptre o'er the deep
Has touched, and broken slavery's
chain;
Yet, strange magician ! she enslaves
Our hearts within her own domain.
Her spirit is devout, and burns
With thoughts averse to bigotiy;
Yet she, herself the idol, turns
Our thoughts into idolatiy,
[From the Pleasures of Hope.]
THE DISTANT IX NATURE AND
EXPERIENCE.
At summer eve, when Heaven's ethe-
real bow-
Spans with bright arch the glittering
hills below,
Why to yon mountain turns the mus-
ing eye,
Whose sunbright summit mingles
with the sky ?
116
CAMPBELL.
Why do those cliffs of shadowy tint
appear
More sweet than all the landscape
smiling near ? —
'Tis distance lends enchantment to
the view,
And rohes the mountain in its azure
hue.
Thus, with delight, we linger to sur-
vey
The promised joys of life's unmeas-
ured way ;
Thus, from afar, each dim-discovered
scene
More pleasing seems than all the past
hath been,
And every form, that Fancy can re-
pair
From dark oblivion, grows divinely
there
Auspicious Hope ! in thy sweet gar-
den grow
Wreaths for each toil, a charm for
every woe;
Won by their sweets, in Nature's
languid hour,
The wayworn pilgrim seeks thy sum-
mer bower ;
There, as the wild bee murmurs on
the wing,
What peaceful dreams thy handmaid
spirits bring!
What viewless forms th' ^olian
organ play.
And sweep the furrowed lines of
anxious thought away.
[From The Pleasures of Hope.]
HOPE nV ADVEPSITY.
Bright as the pillar rose at Heaven's
command.
When Israel marched along the des-
ert land,
Blazed through the night on lonely
wilds afar.
And told the path, — a never-setting
star:
So, heavenly Genius, in thy course
divine,
Hope is thy star, her light is ever
thine.
[From The Pleasures of Hope.]
DOMESTIC HAPPINESS.
Let winter come! let polar spirits
sweep
The darkening world, and tempest-
troubled deep !
Though boundless snows the with-
ered heath deform.
And the dim sun scarce wanders
through the storm,
Yet shall the smile of social love re-
pay,
With mental light, the melancholy
day !
And, when its short and sullen noon
is o'er.
The ice-chained waters slumbering
on the shore.
How bright the fagots in his little hall
Blaze on the hearth, and warm his
pictured wall !
How blest he names, in Love's famil-
iar tone.
The kind, fair friend, by nature
marked his own ;
And, in the waveless mirror of his
mind.
Views the fleet years of pleasure left
behind.
Since when her empire o'er his heart
began !
Since first he called her his before the
holy man !
Trim the gay taper in his rustic dome.
And light the wintry paradise of
home ;
And let the half-micurtained window
hail
Some way-worn man benighted in the
vale!
Now, while the moaning night-wind
rages high,
As sweep the shot-stars down the
troubled sky.
While fiery hosts in Heaven's wide
circle play.
And bathe in lurid light the milky-
way,
Safe from the storm, the meteor, and
the shower.
Some pleasing page shall charm the
solemn hour —
With pathos shall command, with wit
beguile,
A generous tear of anguish, or a
smile.
[From The Pleasures of Hope.]
APOSTROPHE TO HOPE.
Unfading Hope ! when life's last
embers burn,
When soul to soul, and dust to dust
return !
Heaven to thy charge resigns the
awful hour !
Oh! then, thy kingdom comes, im-
mortal Power!
What though each spark of earth-
born rapture fly
The quivering lip, pale cheek, and
closing eye !
Bright to the soul thy seraph hands
convey
The morning dream of life's eternal
day —
Then, then the triumph and the
trance begin.
And all the phoenix spirit burns
within !
[From The Pleasures of Hope.]
AGAINST SKEPTICAL PHILOSO-
PHY.
Ake these the pompous tidings ye
proclaim,
Lights of the world, and demigods of
Fame '?
Is this your triu)nj)h — this your
proud applause.
Children of Truth, and champion of
her cause ?
For this hath Science searched on
weaiy wing,
By shore and sea — each mute and
living thing!
Launched with Iberia's pilot from
the steep.
To worlds unknown and isles beyond
the deep ?
Or round the cope her living chariot
driven,
And wheeled in triumph through the
signs of Heaven.
Oh ! star-eyed Science, hast thou wan-
dered there,
To waft us home the message of des-
pair '?
Then bind the palm, thy sage's brow
to suit.
Of blasted leaf, and death-distilling
fruit !
Ah me ! the laurelled wreath that
Murder rears.
Blood-nursed, and watered by the
widow's tears.
Seems not so foul, so tainted, and so
dread.
As waves the night-shade round the
skeptic head.
What is the bigot's torch, the tyrant's
chain ?
I smile on death, if Heavenward
Hope remain:
But, if the warring winds of Nature's
strife
Be all the faithless charter of my life,
If Chance awakened, inexorable power
This fi'ail and feverish being of an
hour ;
Doomed o'er the world's precarious
scene to sweep.
Swift as the tempest travels on the
deep.
To know Delight but by her parting
smile,
And toil, and wish, and weep a little
while;
Then melt, ye elements, that formed
in vain
This troubled pulse and visionaiy
brain !
Fade, ye wild flowers, memorials of
my doom,
And sink, ye stars, that light me to
the tomb!
Truth, ever lovely, — since the world
began.
The foe of tyrants, and the friend of
man. —
How can thy words from balmy slum-
ber start
Reposing Virtue pillowed on the
heart !
118
CABEW— CARLYLE.
Yet, if thy voice the note of thunder
Oh! let her read, nor loudly, nor
rolled,
elate,
And that were true whicla Nature
The doom that bars us from a better
never told.
fate;
Let Wisdom smile not on her con-
But, sad as angels for the good man's
quered field
sin,
No rapture dawns, no treasure is re-
Weep to record, and blush to give
vealed !
it in!
Thomas Carew.
DISDAIN RETURNED.
He that loves a rosy cheek
Or a coral lip admires.
Or from starlike eyes doth seek
Fuel to maintain his fires;
As old Time makes these decay.
So his flames must waste away.
But a smooth and steadfast mind.
Gentle thoughts and calm desires,
Hearts with equal love combined,
Kindle never-dying fires : —
W^here these are not, I despise
Lovely cheeks or lips or eyes.
No tears, Celia, now shall win.
My resolved heart to return ;
I have searched the soul within
And find nouglit but pride and
scorn ;
I have learned thy arts, and now
Can disdain as much as thou !
ASK ME NO MORE.
Ask me no more where Jove bestows.
When June is past, the fading rose.
For in your beauty's orient deep
These flowers, as in their causes, sleep,
Ask me no more whither do stray
The golden atoms of the day.
For, in pure love, heaven did prepare
Those powders to enrich your hair.
Ask me no more whither doth haste
The nightingale when May is past.
For in your sweet dividing throat
She winters and keeps M'arm her note.
Ask me no more where those stars light
That downwards fall in dead of night,
For in your eyes they sit, and there
Fixed become as in their sphere.
Ask me no more if east or west
The pha?nix builds her spicy nest.
For unto you at last she flies,
And in your fragrant bosom dies.
Thomas Carlyle.
TO-DA Y.
So here hath been dawning another
blue day !
Think, wilt thou let it slip useless
away '?
Out of eternity this new day was born ;
Into eternity at night will return.
Behold it aforetime, no eye ever did ;
So soon it forever from all eyes is
hid.
Here hath been dawning another
blue day ;
Think, wilt thou let it slip useless
away.
CABY.
119
CUI BONO?
What is hope ? A smiling rainbow
Children follow through the net :
'Tis not here — still yonder, yonder;
Never urchin found it yet.
What is life ? A thawing iceboard
On a sea with sunny shore :
Gay we sail ; it melts beneath us ;
We are sunk, and seen no more.
What is man ? A foolish baby ;
Vainly strives, and fights, and
frets :
Demanding all, deserving nothing.
One small grave is all "he gets.
Alice Gary.
LIFE.
Solitude ! Life is inviolate soli-
tude ;
Never was truth so apart from the
dreaming
As lietli the selfhood inside of the
seeming.
Guarded with triple shield out of all
quest,
So that the sisterhood nearest and
sweetest.
So that the brotherhood kindest,
completest,
Is but an exchanging of signals at
best.
Desolate ! Life is so dreary and
desolate.
Women and men in the crowd
meet and mingle.
Yet with itself every soul standeth
single.
Deep out of sympathy moaning its
moan ;
Holding and having its brief ex-
ultation ;
Making its lonesome and low la-
mentation ;
Fighting its terrible conflicts alone.
Separate ! Life is so sad and so sep-
arate.
Under love's ceiling with roses for
lining.
Heart mates with heart in a tender
entwining.
Yet never the sweet cup of love fill-
eth full.
Eye looks in eye with a question-
ing wonder.
Why are we thus in our meeting
asunder ?
Why are our pulses so slow and so
dull?
Fruitless, fruitionless ! Life is fru-
itionless;
Never the heaped-up and generous
measure ;
Never the substance of satisfied
pleasure ;
Never the moment with rapture
elate;
But draining the chalice, we long
for the chalice.
And live as an alien inside of our
palace,
Bereft of our title and deeds of estate.
Pitiful ! Life is so poor and so piti-
ful.
Cometh the cloud on the goldenest
weather ;
Briefly the man and his youth stay
together.
Falleth the frost ere the harvest is in,
And conscience descends from the
open aggression
To timid and troubled and tearful
concession,
And downward and down into parley
with sin.
Purposeless ! Life is so wayward and
purposeless.
Always before us the object is
shifting,
120
CARY.
Always the means and the method
are drifting.
We rue what is done — what is un-
done deplore ;
More striving for high things than
things that are holy.
And so we go down to the valley
so lowly,
Wherein there is work, and device
never more.
Vanity, vanity ! All would be vanity.
Whether in seeking or getting our
pleasures,
Whether in spending or hoarding
our treasures.
Whether in indolence, whether in
strife —
Whether in feasting and whether
in fasting.
But for our faith in the Love ever-
lasting —
But for the Life that is better than
life.
THE FERR Y OF GALL A WA Y.
Ix the stormy waters of Gallaway
My boat had been idle the livelong
day,
Tossing and tumbling to and fro,
For the wind was high and the tide
was low.
The tide was low and the wind was
high,
And we were heavy, my heart and I,
For not a traveller all the day
Had crossed the ferry of Gallaway.
At set o' th' sun, the clouds out-
spread
Like wings of darkness overhead,
VMien, out o' th' west, my eyes took
heed
Of a lady, riding at full speed.
Tlie hoof-strokes struck on the flinty
hill
Like silver ringing on silver, till
I saw the veil in her fair hand float,
i\i\A flutter a signal for my boat.
The waves ran backward as if aware
Of a presence more than mortal fair,
And my little craft leaned down and
lay
With her side to th' sands o' th' Gal-
laway.
" Haste, good boatman! haste! " she
cried,
" And row me over the other side! "
And she stripped from her finger the
shining ring.
And gave it me for the ferrying.
" Woe 's me ! my Lady, I may not go,
For the wind is high and th' tide is
low,
And rocks, like dragons, lie in the
wave, —
Slip back on your finger the ring you
gave! "
" Nay, nay! for the rocks will be
melted down,
And the waters, they never will let
me drown,
And the wind a pilot will prove to
thee.
For my dying lover, he waits for
me!"
Then bridle-ribbon and silver spur
She put in my hand, but I answered
her:
" The wind is high and the tide is
low, —
I must not, dare not, and will not go ! "
Her face grew deadly white with pain,
And she took her champing steed by
th' mane.
And bent his neck to th' ribbon and
spur
That lay in my hand, — but I an-
swered her:
" Though you should proffer me
twice and thrice
Of ring and ribbon and steed the
price, —
The leave of kissing your lily-like
hand !
I never could row you safe to th'
land."
CAJRY.
121
'" Then God have mercy! " she faint-
ly cried,
'• For ray lover is dying the other
side!
O cruel, O cruellest Gallaway,
Be parted, and make me a path, I
pray ! ' '
Of a sudden, the sun shone large and
bright
As if he were staying away the night;
And the rain on the river fell as
sweet
As the pitying tread of an angel's
feet.
And spanning the water from edge
to edge
A rainbow stretched like a golden
bridge.
And I put the rein in her hand so
fair.
And she sat in her saddle th' queen
o' th' air.
And over the river, from edge to
edge.
She rode on the shifting and shim-
mering bridge.
And landing safe on the farther
side, —
"Love is thy conqueror, Death!"
she cried.
COUNSEL.
Seek not to walk by borrowed light.
But keep unto thine own :
Do what thou doest with thy might.
And trust thyself alone !
Work for some good, nor idly lie
Within the human hive ;
And though the outward man should
die,
Keep thou the heart alive !
Strive not to banish pain and doubt.
In pleasure's noisy din;
The peace thou seekest for without
Is only found within.
If fortune disregard thy claim.
By worth, her slight attest;
Nor blush and hang the head for
shame
When thou hast done thy best.
Disdain neglect, ignore despair.
On loves and friendships gone
Plant thou thy feet, as on a stair,
And mount right up and on !
A DUE AM.
I DREAMED I had a plot of ground.
Once when I chanced asleep to
drop,
And that a green hedge fenced it
round.
Cloudy with roses at the top.
I saw a hundred mornings rise, —
So far a little dream may reach, —
And Spring with Summer in her eyes
Making the chief est charm of each.
A thousand vines were climbing o'er
The hedge, I thought, but as I tried
To pull them down, for evermore
The flowers dropt off the other side !
Waking, I said, "These things are
signs
Sent to instruct us that 'tis ours
Duly to keep and dress our vines, —
Waiting in patience for the flowers.
" And when the angel feared of all
Across my hearth its shadow
spread.
The rose that climbed my garden wall
Has bloomed the other side," I said.
SPEXT AND MISSPEXT.
Stay yet a little longer in the sky,
O golden color of the evening sun!
Let not the sweet day in its sweet-
ness die.
While my day's work is only just
begun.
122
CAR v.
Counting the happy chances strewn
about
Thick as the leaves, and saying
wliich was best,
Tlie rosy Hghts of morning all went
out.
And it was burning noon, and
time to rest.
Then leaning low upon a piece of
shade,
Fringed round with violets and
pansies sweet,
"My heart and I," I said, "will be
delayed.
And plan our work while cools the
sultry heat."
Deep in the hills, and out of silence
vast,
A waterfall played up his silver
tune ;
My plans lost purpose, fell to dreams
at last.
And held me late into the after-
noon.
But when the idle pleasures ceased
to please.
And I awoke, and not a plan was
planned.
Just as a drowning man at what he
sees
Catches for life, I caught the thing
at hand.
And so life's little work-day hour has
all
Been spent and misspent doing
what I could,
And in regrets and efforts to recall
The chance of having, being, what
I would.
And so sometimes I cannot choose
but cry.
Seeing my late-sown flowers are
hardly set ;
O darkening color of the evening sky,
Spare me the day a little longer
yet.
LIFE'S MYSTERY.
Life's sadly solemn mystery.
Hangs o'er me like a weight;
The glorious longing to be free,
The gloomy bars of fate.
Alternately the good and ill.
The light and dark, are strung;
Fountains of love within my heart.
And hate upon my tongue.
Beneath my feet the unstable ground.
Above my head the skies ;
Immortal longings in my soul.
And death before my eyes.
No purely pure, and perfect good,
No high, unhindered power;
A beauteous promise in the bud,
And mildew on the flower.
The glad, green brightness of the
spring;
The summer, soft and warm ;
The faded autumn's fluttering gold,
The whirlwind and the storm.
To find some sure interpreter
My spirit vainly tries ;
I only know that God is love,
And know that love is wise.
NO RING.
What is it that doth spoil the fair
adorning
"With which her body she would
dignify,
When from her bed she rises in the
morning
To comb, and plait, and tie
Her hair with ribbons, colored like
the sky ?
What is it that her pleasure discom-
poses
When she would sit and sing the
sun away — [roses.
Making her see dead roses in red
And in the downfall gray
A blight that seems the world to
overlay ?
What is it makes the trembling look
of trouble
About her tender mouth and eye-
lids fair '?
Ah me, ah me ! she feels her heart
beat double,
Without the mother's prayer,
And her wild fears are more than
she can bear.
To the poor sightless lark new pow-
ers are given,
Xot only with a golden tongue to
sing.
But still to make her wavering way
toward heaven
With imdiscerning wing;
But what to her doth her sick sorrow
bring ?
Her days she turns, and yet keeps
overturning.
And her flesh shrinks as if she felt
the rod ;
For 'gainst her will she thinks hard
things concerning
The everlasting God,
And longs to be insensate like the
clod.
Sweet Heaven, be pitiful I rain down
upon her [such :
The saintly charities ordained for
She was so poor in everything but
honor, ' [much!
And she loved much — loved
Would, Lord, she had thy garment's
hem to touch.
Haply, it was the hungry heart with-
in her.
The woman's heart, denied its nat-
lu-al right.
That made of her the thing which
men call sinner.
Even in her own despite ;
Lord, that her judges might receive
their sight!
Phoebe Gary.
XEARER HOME.
OXE sweetly solemn thought
Comes to me o'er and o'er;
I am nearer home to-day
Than I ever have been before ;
Xearer my father's house.
Where the many mansions be ;
Xearer the great white throne,
Nearer the ciystal sea ;
Xearer the boimd of life.
Where we lay our burdens down ;
Xearer leaving the cross,
Xearer gaining the crown I
But lying darkly between.
Winding down through the night,
Is the silent unknown stream.
That leads at last to the light.
Closer and closer my steps
Come to the dread abysm :
Closer Death to my lips
Presses the awful chrism.
Oh. if my mortal feet
Have almost gained the brink ;
If it be I am nearer home
Even to-day than I think ;
Father, perfect my trust ;
Let my spirit feel in death.
That her feet are firmly set
On the rock of a living faith I
DEAD LOVE.
We are face to face, and between us
here
Is the love we thought could never
die;
Why has it only lived a year ?
Who has murdered it — vou or I ?
124
CARY.
No matter who — the deed was done
By one or both, and there it lies;
The smile from the lip forever gone,
And darkness over the beautiful
eyes.
Our love is dead, and our hope is
wrecked ;
So what does it profit to talk and
rave,
Whether it perished by my neglect,
Or whether your cruelty dug its
grave !
Why should you say that I am to
blame.
Or why should I charge the sin on
you ?
Our work is before us all the same.
And the guilt of it lies between us
two.
W^e have praised our love for its
beauty and grace ;
Now we stand here, and hardly
dare
To turn the face-cloth back from the
face,
And see the thing that is hidden
there.
Yet look! ah, that heart has beat its
last.
And the beautiful life of our life is
o'er,
And when we have buried and left
the past,
We two, together, can walk no
more.
You might stretch yourself on the
dead, and weep.
And pray as the prophet prayed,
in pain;
But not like him could you break the
sleep,
And bring the soul to the clay again.
Its head in my bosom I can lay.
And shower my woe there, kiss on
kiss.
But there never was resurrection-day
In the world for a love so dead as
this.
And, since we cannot lessen the sin
By mourning over the deed we did.
Let us draw the winding-sheet up to
the chin.
Ay, up till the death-blind eyes
are hid !
THE LADY JAQUELINE.
" False and fickle, or fair and sweet,
I care not for the rest,
The lover that knelt last night at my
feet
Was the bravest and the best.
Let them perish all, for their power
has waned.
And their glory waxed dim;
They were well enough while they
lived and reigned,
But never was one like him !
And never one from the past would
I bring
Again, and call him mine; —
The King is dead, long live the
King!"
Said the Lady Jaqueline.
" In the old, old days, when life was
new,
And the world upon me smiled,
A pretty, dainty lover 1 had.
Whom I loved with the heart of a
child.
When the buried sun of yesterday
Comes back from the shadows dim,
Then may his love return to me.
And the love I had for him !
But since to-day hath a better thing
To give, I'll ne'er repine; —
The King is dead, long live the
King! "
Said the Lady Jaqueline.
" And yet it almost makes me weep.
Aye ! weep, and cry, alas !
When I think of one who lies asleep
Down under the quiet grass.
For he loved me well, and I loved
again.
And low in homag3 bent,
And prayed for his long and prosper-
ous reign.
In our realm of sweet content.
But not to the dead may the living
cling,
Nor kneel at an empty shrine ; —
The King is dead, long live the King! "
Said the Lady Jaqueline.
"Once, caught by the sheen of stars
and lace,
I bowed for a single day,
To a poor pretender, mean and base.
Unfit for place or SMay.
That must have been the work of a
spell.
For the foolish glamour fled.
As the sceptre from his weak hand
fell, [head;
And the crown from his feeble
But homage true at last I bring
To this rightful lord of mine, —
The King is dead, long live the
King! "
Said the Lady Jaqueline.
"By the hand of one I held most
dear.
And called my liege, my own!
I was set aside in a single year.
And a new queen shares his throne.
To him who is false, and him who is
wed,
Shall I give my fealty ?
Nay, the dead one is not half so dead
As the false one is to me!
My faith to the faithful now I bring,
The faithless I resign; —
The King is dead, long live the
King! "
Said the Lady Jaqueline.
"Yea, all my lovers and kings that
were
Are dead, and hid away.
In the past, as in a sepulchre.
Shut up till the judgment-day.
False or fickle, or weak or wed,
They are all alike to me;
And mine eyes no more can be mis-
led,—
They have looked on loyalty !
Then bring me wine, and garlands
bring
For my king of the right divine; —
The King is dead, long live the King 1^''
Said the Lady Jaqueline.
ARCHIE.
Oil, to be back in the cool summer
shadow
Of that old maple-tree down in the
meadow ;
Watching the smiles that grew dearer
and dearer,
Listening to lips that grew nearer
and nearer;
Oh, to be back in the crimson-topped
clover.
Sitting again with my Archie, my
lover !
Oh, for the time when I felt his ca-
resses
Smoothing away from my forehead
the tresses;
When up from my heart to my cheek
went the blushes.
As he said that my voice was as sweet
as the thrush's;
As he told me, my eyes were be-
witchingly jetty.
And I answered 't was only my love
made them pretty !
Talk not of maiden reserve or of
duty,
Or hide from my vision such visions
of beauty;
Pulses above may beat calmly and
even, —
We have been fashioned for earth,
and not heaven;
Angels are perfect, I am but a
woman ;
Saints may be passionless, Archie is
human.
Say not that heaven hath tenderer
blisses
To her on whose brow drops the soft
rain of kisses;
Preach not the promise of priests or
evangels.
Love-crowned, who asks for the
crown of the angels ?
Yea, all that the wall of pure jasper
encloses.
Takes not the sweetness from sweet
bridal roses!
126
CARY.
Tell me, that when all this life shall
be over,
I shall still love him, and he be my
lover;
That 'mid flowers more fragrant than
clover or heather
My Archie and I shall be always to-
gether.
Loving eternally, met ne'er to sever.
Then you may tell me of heaven for-
ever.
CONCL USIOJVS.
I SAID, if I might go back again
To the very hour and place of my
birth ;
Might have my life whatever I chose,
And live it in any part of the
earth ;
Put perfect simshine into my sky,
Banish the shadow of sorrow and
doubt ;
Have all my happiness multiplied,
And all my suffering stricken out ;
If I could have known in the years
now gone,
The best that a woman comes to
know ;
Could have had whatever will make
her blest,
Or whatever she thinks will make
her so;
Have found the highest and purest
bliss
That the bridal-wreath and ring
enclose ;
And gained the one out of all the
world.
That my heart as well as my reason
chose;
And if this had been, and I stood to-
night
By my children, lying asleep in
their beds
And could count in my prayers, for a
rosary.
The shining row of their golden
heads;
Yea ! I said, if a miracle such as this
Could be wrought for me, at my
bidding, still [is,
I would choose to have my past as it
And to let my future come as it
will!
I would not make the path I have
trod
More pleasant or even, more
straight or wide;
Nor change my course the breadth of
a hair.
This way or that way, to either
side.
My past is mine, and I take it all ;
Its weakness, — its folly, if you
please ;
Nay, even my sins, if you come to
that,
May have been my helps, not hin-
drances !
If I saved my body from the flames
Because that once I had burned
my hand ;
Or kept myself from a greater sin
By doing a less, — you will mider-
stand ;
It was better I suffered a little pain,
Better I sinned for a little time.
If the smarting warned me back from
death.
And the sting of sin withheld from
crime.
Who knows his strength, by trial,
will know
What strength must be set against
a sin ;
And how temptation is overcome
He has learned, who has felt its
power within !
And who knows how a life at the
last may show ?
Why, look at the moon from
where we stand !
Opaque, uneven, you say; yet it
shines,
A luminous sphere, complete and
crand !
OUR HOMESTEAD.
Page 127.
So let my past stand, just as it
stands.
And let me now, as I may, grow
old;
I am what I am, and my life for me
Is the best. — or it had not been, I
hold.
ANSWERED.
I THOUGHT to find some healing
clime [shore.
For her I loved; she found that
That city, whose inhabitants
Are sick and sorrowful no more.
I asked for human love for her ;
The Loving knew how best to still
The infinite yearning of a heart,
Which but infinity could fill.
Such sweet communion had been
ours
I prayed that it might never end ;
My prayer is more than answered;
now
I liave an angel for my friend.
I wished for perfect peace, to soothe
The troubled anguish of lier
breast; [called.
And, numbered with the loved and
She entered on untroubled rest.
Life was so fair a thing to her,
I wept and pleaded for its stay ;
My wisli was granted me, for lo !
She hath eternal life to-day.
OUR HOMESTEAD.
Our old brown homestead reared its
walls
From the way-side dust aloof,
Where the apple-boughs could almost
cast
Their fruit upon its roof;
And tlie cherry-tree so near it grew
That when awake I've lain
In tlie lonesome nights, I've heard
the limbs
As they creaked against the pane :
And those orchard trees, oh those
orchard trees!
I've seen my little brothers rocked
In their tops by the summer breeze.
The sweet-briar, under the window-
sill,
Which the early birds made glad.
And the damask rose, by the garden-
fence.
Were all the flowers we had.
I've looked at many a flower since
then.
Exotics rich and rare,
That to other eyes were lovelier
But not to me so fair ;
For those roses bright, oh, those
roses bright! [locks,
I have twined them in my sister's
That are hid in the dust from sight.
We had a well, a deep old well.
Where the spring Avas never dry.
And the cool drops down from the
mossy stones
Were falling constantly;
And there never Avas water half so
sweet
As the draught which filled my cup.
Drawn up to the curb by the rude
old sweep
That my father's hand set up.
And that deep old well, oh that deep
old well!
I remember now the plashing sound
Of the bucket as it fell.
Our homestead had an ample hearth.
Where at night Ave loved to meet ;
There my mother's voice Avas alAA'ays
kind.
And her smile Avas alAA'ays sweet;
And there I've sat on my father's
knee.
And Avatched his thoughtful brow.
With my childish hand in his raven
hair, —
That liair is silver now!
But that broad heartli's light, oh,
that broad hearth's light!
And my father's look, and my moth-
er's smile.
They are in my heart to-night !
128
CLARK.
LuELLA Clark.
IF YOU LOVE ME.
If you love me, tell me not ;
Let me read it in yom- thought ;
Let me feel it in the way
That you say me yea and nay ;
Let me see it in your eye
When you greet or pass me by ;
Let me hear it in the tone
Meant for me and me alone.
If you love me, there will be
Something only I shall see ;
Meet or miss me, stay or go,
If you love me, I shall know.
Something in your tone will tell,
" Dear, I love you, love you well."
Something in your eyes will shine
Fairer that they look in mine.
In your mien some touch of grace.
Some swift smile upon your face
While you speak not, will betray
What your lips could scarcely say.
In your speech some silver word.
Tuning into sweet accord
All your bluntness will reveal.
Unaware, the love you feel.
If you love me, then, I pray,
Tell me not, but, day by day.
Let love silent on me rise,
Like the sun in sunnner skies.
Sarah D. Clark.
THE SOLDANELLA.
In the Avarm valley, i-ich in summer's
wealth,
Where tangled weed and shrub thin
leaves unclose.
Profuse and hardy in luxuriant
health,
The Soldanella grows.
Common — if aught be common in
God's care, —
Its buds no beauty show to charm
the eye.
Nor graceful pencillings in colors rare.
Enchant the passer-by.
Yet, on yon distant heights of ice-
pearled snow,
Where mortals barely can a pathway
trace.
The Alpine blossom of the vale be-
low
Blooms in ethereal grace.
Unlike, and yet the same, its petals
blow
Most like a crj'stal lily in the
air;
A dream of beauty 'mid the cheer-
less snow, —
A comfort in despair.
How came it trembling in the icy
gloom
Where awful steppes and frowning
glaciers rise
So marvellous in presence and in
bloom
Even to angelic eyes ?
While thus I mused, the fragile blos-
som seemed
Instinct with life, a spirit-form to
take;
Its fringed corolla with new radiance
beamed
A voice within it spake : —
^p"
CLEMMER.
129
■'Men man-el on these aiiy fields of
Take, with the fragrance of my lat-
space
est breath.
My tender form emergent to behold,
This lesson to thy heart :
A blossom of the skies — my name they
trace
" Go thou, to triumph in some glori-
With stars and suns enrolled.
ous strife.
Through daring paths some noble
" Though born and nurtiu-ed in the
cause retrieve ;
lowly vale,
Seek, to the highest measure of thy
Ignoble ease I was not doomed to
life.
bear;
Thy pm-pose to achieve.
I pined to scale the heights where
eagles sail.
'' Go tell the world, in Freedom's bat-
And paled for Freedom's air!
tle drawn,
For one brief hour, its horoscope I
"Not without toil my painful steps
see;
were bent
Tell one by one who fall, ' Swift
Through paths imperilled, and the
comes the dawn
icy sea,
To herald victory.' "
From Alp to Alp I gained my steep
ascent.
It ceased — the murmur died upon
And hard- won victory !
mine ear.
Straightway a threatening blast the
"If these pale lips, so soon to close
trmnpet gave ;
in death.
The next wind bore the seedling of
One touch of hope or solace can im-
the year
part,
On to its snowy grave !
Mary Clemmer.
WORDS FOR PARTING.
Oh, what shall I do, dear,
In the coming years, I wonder,
"When our paths, which lie so sweetly
near,
Shall lie so far asunder ?
Oh, what shall I do, dear.
Through all the sad to-morrows.
When the sunny smile has ceased to
cheer
That smiles away my sorrows ?
What shall I do, my friend.
When you are gone forever ?
My heart its eager need will send
Through the years to find you
never.
And how will it be with you.
In the weary world, I wonder,
Will you love me with a love as true,
When oiu" paths lie far asunder ?
A sweeter, sadder thing
My life, for having known you;
Forever with my sacred kin,
My soul's soul I must own you.
Forever mine, my friend.
From June to life's December;
Not mine to have or hold.
But to pray for and remember.
The way is short, O friend.
That reaches out before us ;
God's tender heavens above us bend,
His love is smiling o'er us;
A little while is ours
For sorrow or for laughter ;
I'll lay the hand you love in yours
On the shore of the Hereafter.
NANTASKET.
Fair is thy face, Nantasket,
And fair tliy curving shores, —
The peering spires of villages,
The boatman's dipping oars.
The lonely ledge of Minot,
Where the watchman tends his
light,
And sets his perilous beacon,
A star in the stormiest night.
Over thy vast sea highway.
The great ships slide from sight.
And flocks of winged phantoms
Flit by, like birds in flight.
Over the toppling sea-wall
The home-bound dories float,
And I watch the patient fisherman
Bend in his anchored boat.
I am alone with Nature ;
"With the glad September day.
The leaning hills above me
With golden-rod are gay,
Across tlie fields of ether
Flit butterflies at play.
And cones of garnet sumach
Glow down the country way.
The autumn dandelion
Along the roadside burns ;
Down from the lichened boulders
Quiver the plumed ferns;
The cream-white silk of the milkweed
Floats from its sea-green pod ;
Out from the mossy rock-seams
Flashes the golden-rod.
The woodbine's scarlet banners
Flaunt from their towers of stone;
The wan, wild morning-glory
Dies by the road alone ;
By the hill-path to the seaside
Wave myriad azure bells ;
And over the grassy ramparts lean
The milky immortelles.
Hosts of gold-hearted daisies
Nod by the wayside bars ;
The tangled thicket of green is set
With the aster's purple stars;
Beside the brook the gentian
Closes its fringed eyes.
And waits the later glory
Of October's yellow skies.
Within the sea-washed meadow
The wild grape climbs the wall,
And from the o'er-ripe chestnuts
The brown burs softly fall.
I see the tall reeds shiver
Beside the salt sea marge ;
I see the sea-bird glimmer.
Far out on airy barge.
I hear in the groves of Hingham
The friendly caw of the crow.
Till I sit again in AVachusett's woods,
In August's sumptuous glow.
The tiny boom of the beetle
Strikes the shining rocks below;
The gauzy oar of the dragon-fly
Is beating to and fro.
As the lovely ghost of the thistle
Goes sailing softly by ;
Glad in its second summer
Hums the awakened fly ;
The cumulate cry of the cricket
Pierces the amber noon ;
In from the vast sea-spaces comes
The clear call of the loon ;
Over and through it all I hear
Ocean's pervasive rune.
Against the warm sea-beaches
Bush the wavelets' eager lips;
4-way o'er the sapphire reaches
Move on the stately ships.
Peace floats on all their pennons,
Sailing silently the main.
As if never human anguish,
As if never human pain.
Sought the healing draught of Lethe,
Beyond the gleaming plain.
Fair is the earth behind me.
Vast is the sea before.
Away through the misty dimness
Glimmers a further shore.
It is no realm enchanted,
It cannot be more fair
Than this nook of Nature's Kingdom.
With its si)ell of space and air.
C LOUGH.
131
WAITING.
I WAIT, —
Till from my veiled brows shall fall
This bafflinc cloud, this wearying
thrall,"'
Which holds nie now from knowing
all;
Until my spirit-sight shall see
Into all being's mystery.
See what it really is to be !
I wait, —
Willie rolling days in mockery fling
Such cruel loss athwart my spring.
And life flags on with broken wing ;
Believing that a kindlier fate
The patient soul will compensate
For all it loses, ere too late.
I wait !
For surely every scanty seed
I plant in weakness and in need
Will blossom in perfected deed !
Mine eyes shall see its affluent crown,
Its fragrant fruitage, dropping down
Care's lowly levels, bare and brown!
I wait !
The summer of the soul is long.
Its harvests yet shall round me throng
In perfect pomp of sun and song.
In stormless mornings yet to be
I'll pluck from life's full-fruited tree
The joy to-day denied to me.
Arthur Hugh Clough.
NO MORE.
My wind has turned to bitter north,
That was so soft a south before ;
My sky, that shone so sunny bright,
With foggy gloom is clouded o'er;
My gay green leaves are yellow-black
Upon the dark autumnal floor ;
For love, departed once, comes back
No more again, no more.
to
A roofless ruin lies my home,
For winds to blow and rains
pour ;
One frosty night befell — and lo !
I find my summer days are o'er.
The heart bereaved, of why and how
Unknowing, knows that yet before
It had what e'en to memory now
Returns no more, no more.
BECALMED AT EVE.
As ships, becalmed at eve, that lay
With canvas drooping, side by side.
Two towers of sail, at dawn of day
Are scai-ce long leagues apart des-
cried ;
When fell the night, upsprung the
breeze.
And all the darkling hours they
plied ;
Nor dreamt but each the self-same
seas
By each was cleaving, side by side :
E'en so — but why the tale reveal
Of those whom, year by year un-
changed.
Brief absence joined anew, to feel,
Astounded, soul from soul es-
tranged.
At dead of night their sails were
filled.
And onward each rejoicing steered ;
Ah ! neither blamed, for neither willed
Or wist what first with dawn ap-
peared.
To veer, how vain! On, onward
strain.
Brave barks ! In light, in darkness
too!
Through Minds and tides one com-
pass guides —
To that and your own selves be true.
But O blithe breeze ! and O great seas,
Though ne'er that earUest parting
past,
On your wide plain they join again,
Together lead them home at last.
One port, methought, alike they
sought —
One pui-pose hold where'er they
fare;
O bounding breeze, O rushing seas.
At last, at last unite them there !
NATUnA NATURANS.
Beside me, — in the car, — she sat;
She spake not, no, nor looked to
me.
From her to me, from me to her.
What passed so subtly, stealthily ?
As rose to rose, that by it blows.
Its interchanged aroma flings ;
Or wake to sound of one sweet note
The virtues of disparted strings.
Beside me, nought but tliis ? — but
this.
That influent; as within me dwelt
Her life; mine too within her breast,
Her brain, her eveiy limb, she felt.
We sat; while o'er and in us, more
And more, a power unknown pre-
vailed.
Inhaling and inhaled. — and still
'Twas one, inhaling or inhaled.
Beside me, nought but this; and
passed —
I passed ; and know not to this day
If gold or jet her girlish hair —
If black, or brown, or lucid-gray
Her eye's young glance. The fickle
chance
That joined us yet may join again ;
But I no face again could greet
As hers, whose life was in me then.
As unsuspecting mere a maid —
As fresh in maidhood's bloomiest
bloom —
In casual second-class did e'er
By casual youth her seat assume ;
Or vestal, say, of saintliest clay,
For once by balmiest airs betrayed
Unto emotions too, too sweet
To be unlingeringly gainsaid.
Unowning then, confusing soon
AVith dreamier dreams that o'er
the glass
Of shyly ripening woman-sense
Reflected, scarce reflected, pass —
A wife may be, a mother, she
In Hymen's shrine recalls not now
She first — in hour, ah, not profane ! —
With me to Hymen learnt to bow.
Ah no ! — yet owned we, fused in one,
The power Avhich, e'en in stones
and earths
By blind elections felt, in forms
Organic breeds to myriad births ;
By lichen small on granite wall
Ai^proved, its faintest, feeblest stir
Slow-spreading, strengthening long,
at last
Vibrated full in me and her.
In me and her sensation strange!
The lily grew to pendent head ;
To vernal airs the mossy bank
Its sheeny primrose spangles spread ;
In roof o'er roof of shade sun-proof
Did cedar strong itself outclimb;
And altitude of aloe proud
Aspire in floral crown sublime ;
Flashed flickering forth fantastic
flies;
Big bees their burly bodies swmig;
Rooks roused with civic din the elms;
And lark its wild reveille rimg;
In Libyan dell the light gazelle.
The leopard lithe in Indian glade,
And dolphin, brightening tropic seas,
In us were living, leapt and played.
Their shells did slow Crustacea build ;
Their gilded skins did snakes re-
new ;
While mightier spines for loftier kind
Their types in amplest limbs out-
grew;
Yea, close comprest in human breast,
What moss, and tree, and livelier
thincr —
Such sweet preluding sense, of old
Led on in Eden's sinless place
The hour when bodies human
first
Combined the primal, prime em-
brace ;
Such genial heat the blissful seat
In man and woman owned un-
blamed.
When, naked both, its garden paths
They walked unconscious, un-
ashamed ;
Ere, clouded yet in mightiest dawn,
Above the horizon dusk and dun,
One mountain crest with light had
tipped
That orb that is the spirit's sun;
Ere dreamed young flowers in vernal
showers
Of fruit to rise the flower above.
Or ever yet to young Desire
Was told the mystic name of love.
Hartley Coleridge.
ADDRESS TO CERTAIN GOLD-
FISHES.
Restless forms of living light
Quivering on your lucid wings,
Cheating still the curious sight
With a thousand shadowings ;
Various as the tints of even.
Gorgeous as the hues of heaven,
Reflected on your native streams
In flitting, flashing, billowy gleams !
Harmless warriors, clad in mail
Of silver breastplate, golden scale; —
Mail of Nature's own bestowing.
With peaceful radiance mildly glow-
ing-
Fleet are ye as fleetest galley
Or pirate rover sent from Sallee;
Keener than the Tartar's arrow,
iSport ye in your sea so narrow.
Was the sun himself your sire ?
Were ye born of vital fire ?
Or of the shade of golden flowers,
.Such as we fetch from Eastern bow-
ers,
To mock this murky clime of ours ?
Upwards, downwards, now ye glance,
AVeaving many a mazy dance;
Seeming still to grow in size
When ye would elude our eyes —
Pretty creatm-es ! we might deem
Ye were happy as ye seem —
As gay, as gamesome, and as blithe,
As light, as loving, and as lithe.
As gladly earnest in your play.
As when ye gleamed in far Cathay.
And yet, since on this hapless earth
There's small sincerity in mirth.
And laughter oft is but an art
To drown the outcry of the heart ;
It may be that your ceaseless gambols.
Your wheelings, darlings, divings,
rambles.
Your restless roving round and round,
The circuit of your crystal bound —
Is but the task of weary pain,
An endless labor, dull and vain;
And while your forms are gaily shin-
ing.
Your little lives are inly pining!
Nay — but still I fain would dream
That ye are ha^jpy as ye seem.
THE FLIGHT OF YOUTH.
Youth, thou art fled, — but where
are all the charms
Which, though with thee they came,
and passed with thee.
Should leave a perfume and sweet
memory
134
COLERIDGE.
Of what they have been ? All thy
boons and harms
Have perished quite. Thy oft-re-
vered alarms
Forsake the fluttering echo. Smiles
and tears
Die on my cheek, or, petrified with
years,
Show the dull woe which no compas-
sion warms,
The mirth none shares. Yet could
a wish, a thought,
Unravel all the complex web of
age, —
Could all the characters that Time
hath wrought
Be clean effaced from my memorial
page
By one short word, the word I would
not say ; —
I thank my God because my hairs are
gray.
NOVEMBER.
The mellow year is hasting to its
close;
The little birds have almost sung
their last,
Their small notes twitter in the
dreary blast —
That shrill-piped harbinger of early
snows; —
The patient beauty of the scentless
rose.
Oft with the morn's hoar crystal
quaintly glassed.
Hangs a pale mourner for the sum-
mer past,
And makes a little summer where it
grows ; —
In the chill sunbeam of the faint brief
day
The dusky waters shudder as they
shine;
The russet leaves obstruct the strag-
gling way
Of oozy brooks, which no deep banks
define,
And the gaunt woods, in rag
scant array.
Wrap their old limbs with sombre
ivy-twine.
NO LIFE VAIN.
Let me not deem that I was made
in vain.
Or that my being was an accident,
Which fate, in working its sublime
intent.
Not wished to be, to hinder would
not deign.
Each drop uncounted in a storm of
rain
Hath its own mission, and is duly
sent
To its own leaf or blade, not idly
spent
'Mid myriad dimples on the shipless
main.
The very shadow of an insect's wing.
For which the violet cared not while
it stayed,
Yet felt the lighter for its vanishing.
Proved that the sun was shining by
its shade :
Then can a drop of the eternal spring.
Shadow of living lights, in vain be
made ?
SONG.
She is not fair to outward view,
As many maidens be.
Her loveliness I never knew
Until she smiled on mo;
Oh, then I saw her eye was bright,
A well of love, a spring of light.
But now her looks are coy and cold,
To mine they ne'er reply:
And yet 1 cease not to behold
The lovelight in her eye.
Her very frowns are fairer far
Than smiles of other maidens are.
COLERIDGE.
185
Samuel Taylor Coleridge.
[Passages from The Jiime of the Ancient
Mariner.]
THE SHIP BECALMED.
The fair breeze blew, the white foam
flew,
The furrow followed free ;
We were the first that ever burst
Into that silent sea,
Down dropt the breeze, the sails dropt
down,
" Twas sad as sad could be ;
And we did speak only to break
The silence of the sea !
All in a hot and copper sky.
The bloody sun, at noon,
Right up above the mast did stand,
No bigger than the moon.
Day after day, day after day.
We stuck, nor breath nor motion;
As idle as a painted ship
Upon a painted ocean.
Water, water everywhere.
And all the boards did shrink;
AV'ater, water, everywhere,
Xor any drop to drink.
THE ANCIENT MARINER REFRESHED
BY SLEEP AND RAIN-
SLEEP ! it is a gentle thing.
Beloved from pole to pole !
To Mary queen the praise be given !
She sent the gentle sleep from heaven.
That slid into my soul.
The silly buckets on the deck,
That had so long remained,
1 dreamt that they were filled with
dew ;
And when I awoke it rained.
My lips were wet, my throat was
cold.
My gannents all were dank.
Sure I had drunken in my dreams.
And still my body drank.
I moved, and could not feel my
limbs:
I was so light — almost
I thought that I had died in sleep,
And was a blessed ghost.
THE VOICES OF THE ANGELS.
Akound, around, flew each sweet
sound.
Then darted to the sun ;
Slowly the sounds came back again.
Now mixed, now one by one.
Sometimes a-dropping from the sky
1 heard the sky-lark sing;
Sometimes all little birds that are.
How they seemed to fill the sea and
air
With their sweet jargoning!
And now 'twas like all instruments,
Now like a lonely flute ;
And now it is an angel's song.
That makes the heavens be mute.
It ceased ; yet still the sails made on
A pleasant noise till noon,
A noise like of a hidden brook
In the leafy month of June,
That to the sleeping woods all night
Singeth a quiet tune.
PENANCE OF THE ANCIENT MARINER.
AND HIS REVERENT TEACHING.
Forthwith this frame of mine was
wrenched
With a woful agony.
Which forced me to begin my tale :
And then it left me free.
Since then at an imcertain hour,
That agony returns :
And till my ghastly tale is told,
This heart within me burns.
I pass, like night, from land to land;
I have strange power of speech ;
That moment that his face I see,
I know the man that must hear me :
To him my tale I teach.
What loud uproar bursts from that
door!
The wedding-guests are there:
But in the garden-bower the bride
And bridemaids singing are :
And hark the little vesper bell,
Which biddeth me to prayer!
O Wedding-Guest! this soul hath
been
Alone on a wide wide sea:
So lonely 'twas, that God himself
Scarce seemed there to be.
O sweeter than the marriage-feast,
'Tis sweeter far to me.
To walk together to the kirk,
With a goodly company !
To walk together to the kirk.
And all together pray,
While each to his great Father bends,
Old men, and babes, and loving
friends
And youths and maidens gay !
Farewell, farewell! but this I tell
To thee,thou Wedding-Guest!
He prayeth well, who loveth well
Both man and bird and beast.
He prayeth best, who loveth best
All things both great and small ;
For the dear God who loveth us,
He made and loveth all.
The Mariner, whose eye is bright,
AVhose beard with age is hoar.
Is gone: and now the Wedding-Guest
Turned from the bridegroom's door.
He w^ent like one that hath been
stunned,
And is of sense forlorn :
A sadder and a wiser man,
He rose the morrow morn.
[From ChrisiabeL] ^
BROKEN FltlEynSHlPS.
Alas! they had been friends in
youth ;
But whispering tongues can poison
truth ;
And constancy lives in realms above;
And life is thorny; and youth is
vain;
And to be wroth with one we love,
Doth work like madness in the brain.
And thus it chanced, as I divine.
With Koland and Sir Leoline.
Each spake words of high disdain
And insult to his heart's best brother:
They parted — ne'er to meet again!
But never either found another
To free the hollow heart from pain-
ing—
They stood aloof, the scars remaining.
Like cliffs which had been rent asun-
der
A dreary sea now flows between ; —
But neither heat, nor frost, nor thun-
der,
Shall wholly do away, I ween,
The marks of that which once hath
been.
[From The Three Graves.]
BELL AND BROOK.
'Tis sweet to hear a brook, 'tis sweet
To hear the Sabbath-bell.
' Tis sweet to hear them both at once,
Deep in a woody dell.
[From Dejection.]
A GJUEF without a pang, void, dark,
and drear,
A stifled, drowsy, unimpassioned
grief.
Which finds no natural outlet, no
relief.
In word, or sigh, or tear —
O lady! in this wan and heartless
mood.
COLERIDGE.
To other thoughts by yonder throstle
wooed,
All this long eve, so balmy and se-
rene.
Have I been gazing on the western
sky,
And its pecular tint of yellow
green :
And still I gaze — and with how
blank an eye!
And those thin clouds above, in
flakes and bars.
That give away their motion to the
stars ;
Those stars, that glide behind them
or between,
Now sparkling, now bedimmed, but
always seen :
Yon crescent moon as fixed as if it
grew
In its own cloudless, starless lake of
blue ;
I see them all so excellently fair,
I see, not feel how beautiful they are !
My genial spirits fail;
And what can these avail
To lift the smothering weight from
off my breast ?
It were a vain endeavor,
Though I should gaze forever
On that green light that lingers in
the west:
I may not hope from outward forms
to win
The passion and the life, whose
fountains are within.
O Lady I we receive but what we give,
And in our life alone does nature live :
Ours is her wedding-garment, ours
her shroud !
And would we aught behold, of
higher worth,
Than that inanimate cold world al-
lowed
To the poor loveless, ever-anxious
crowd.
Ah I from the soul itself must issue
forth,
A light, a glory, a fair luminous cloud
Enveloping the earth —
And from the soul itself must there
be sent
A sweet and potent voice, of its
own birth,
Of all sweet sounds the life and ele-
ment !
O pure of heart! thou need'st not
ask of me
What this strong music in the soul
may be !
\\Tiat, and wherein it doth exist,
This light, this glory, this fair lumi-
nous mist.
This beautiful and beauty-making
power.
Joy, virtuous lady, — joy that
ne'er was given.
Save to the pure, and in their purest
hour,
Life, and life's effluence, cloud at
once and shower
Joy, lady, is the spirit and the power,
YyTiich wedding Nature to us gives
in dower,
A new earth and new heaven,
LTndreamt of by the sensual and the
proud —
Joy is the sweet voice, joy the lumi-
nous cloud —
We in ourselves rejoice!
And thence flows all that cliarms or
ear or sight.
All melodies the echoes of that
voice.
All colors a suffusion from that light.
There was a time when, though my
path was rough,
This joy within "me dallied with
distress.
And all misfortimes were but as the
stuff
Whence Fancy made me dreams of
happiness :
For hope grew round me, like the
twining vine.
And fruits, and foliage, not my own,
seemed mine.
But now afflictions bow me down to
earth :
Nor care I that they rob me of my
mirth.
But oh ! each visitation
Suspends wliat nature gave me at my
birth,
138
COLERIDGE.
My shaping spirit of imagination.
For not to tliink of what I needs
must feel.
But to be still and patient, all J
can;
And haply by abstruse research to
steal
From my own nature all the nat-
ural man —
This was my sole resource, my only
plan:
Till that which suits a part infects
the whole.
And now is almost grown the habit
of my soul.
Hence, viper thoughts, that coil
around my mind,
Reality's dark dream!
I turn from you, and listen to the
wind,
Thou actor, perfect in all tragic
sounds !
Thou mighty poet, e'en to frenzy
bold !
What tell'st thou now about ?
'Tis of the rushing of a host in
rout.
With groans of trampled men, with
smarting wounds —
At once they groan with pain, and
shudder A\ith the cold !
But hush! there is a pause of deepest
silence!
And all that noise, as of a rushing
crowd.
With groans, and tremulous shudder-
ings — all is over —
It tells another tale, with sounds
less deep and loud !
A tale of less affright,
And tempered witli delight.
As Otway's self had framed the ten-
der lay,
'Tis of a little child
Upon a lonesome wild,
Not far from home, but she hath
lost her way :
And now moans low in bitter grief
and fear,
And now screams loud, and hopes to
make her mother hear.
HYMN BEFORE SUNRISE IX THE
VALLEY OF CHAMOUNI.
Hast thou a charm to stay the
morning-star
In his steep course ? So long he
seems to pause
On thy bald awful head, O sovran
Blanc!
The Arve and Arveiron at thy
base
Rave ceaselessly; but thou, most aw-
ful form !
Risest from forth thy silent sea of
pines,
How silently! Around thee and above
Deep is the air and dark, substantial,
black.
An ebon mass : methinks thou pierc-
est it.
As with a wedge ! But when I look
again.
It is thine own calm home, thy crys-
tal shrine,
Thy habitation from eternity!
dread and silent mount! I gazed
upon thee.
Till thou, still present to. the bodily
sense.
Didst vanish from my thought: en-
tranced in prayer
1 worshipped the Invisible alone.
Yet, like some sweet beguiling
melody,
So sweet, we know not we are listen-
ing to it.
Thou, the meanwhile, wast blending
with my thought.
Yea, with my life, and life's own se-
cret joy :
Till the dilating soul, enwrapt,
transfused.
Into the mighty vision passing —
there
As in her natural form, swelled vast
to Heaven !
Awake, my soul ! not only passive
praise
Thou owest ! not alone these swelling
tears.
Mute thanks and secret ecstasy!
Awake,
COLERIDGE.
Voice of sweet song. Awake, my
heart, awake !
Green vales and icy cliffs, all join my
hymn.
Thou first and chief, sole sovran
of the vale !
Oh, struggling with the darkness all
the night,
And visited all night by troops of
stars,
Or when they climb the sky or when
they sink:
Companion of the morning-star at
dawn,
Thyself earth's rosy star, and of the
dawn
Co-herald : wake, oh, wake, and utter
praise !
Who sank thy sunless pillars deep in
earth ?
Who filled thy countenance with
rosy light ?
Who made thee parent of perpetual
streams ?
And you, ye five wild torrents
fiercely glad !
Who called you forth from night and
utter death,
From dark and icy caverns called you
forth,
Down those precipitous, black, jag-
ged rocks,
For ever shattered and the same for
ever ?
Who gave you your invulnerable life.
Your strength, your speed, your fury,
and your joy,
Unceasing thunder and eternal foam ?
And who commanded (and the si-
lence came,)
Here let the billows stiffen, and have
rest?
Ye ice-falls I ye that from the
mountain's brow
Adown enormous ravines slope
amain —
Torrents, methinks, that heard a
mighty voice,
And stopped at once amid their mad-
dest plunge!
Motionless torrents! silent cataracts!
Who made you glorious as the gates
of Heaven
Beneath the keen full moon ? Who
bade the sun
Clothe you with rainbows ? Who.
with living flowers
Of loveliest blue, spread garlands at
your feet ? —
God ! let the torrents, like a shout of
nations.
Answer! and let the ice-plains echo,
God!
God ! sing ye meadow-streams, with
gladsome voice !
Ye pine-groves, with your soft and
soul-like sounds !
And they too have a voice, yon piles
of snow.
And in their perilous fall shall thun-
der, God !
Ye living flowers that skirt the eter-
nal frost!
Ye wild goats sporting round the
eagle's nest!
Ye eagles, play-mates of the mountain
storm !
Ye lightnings, the dread arrows of the
clouds !
Ye signs and wonders of the elements !
Utter forth God. and fill the hills
with praise !
Thou too, hoar mount! with thy
sky-pointing peaks,
Oft from whose feet the avalanche,
unheard.
Shoots downward, glittering through
the pure serene
Into the depth of clouds, that veil
thy breast —
Thou too again, stupendous moini-
tain ! thou
That as I raise my head, awhile
bowed low
In adoration, upward from thy base
Slow travelling with dim eyes suf-
fused with tears.
Solemnly seemest, like a vapory
cloud.
To rise before me — Rise, O ever
rise.
Rise like a cloud of incense, from the
earth!
189
140
COLERIDGE.
Thou kingly spirit throned among
the hills,
Thou dread ambassador from Earth
to Heaven,
Great hierarch! tell thou the silent
sky,
And tell the stars, and tell yon rising
sun.
Earth, with her thousand voices,
praises God.
LOVE, HOPE AND PATIENCE IN
EDUCATION.
O'er wayward childhood would'st
thou hold firm rule,
And sun thee in the light of happy
faces ;
Love, Hope, and Patience, these
must be thy graces.
And in thine own heart let tliem first
keep school,
O part them never! If hope pros-
trate lie,
Love too will sink and die.
But Love is subtle, and doth proof
derive
From her own life that Hope is yet
alive;
And bending o'er with soul-transfus-
ing eyes,
And the soft murmurs of the mother
dove,
Woos back the fleeting spirit and
half -supplies; —
Thus Love repays to Hope what
Hope first gave to Love.
Yet haply tliere will come a weary
day
When overtasked at length
Botli Love and Hope beneath the
load give way.
Then with a statue's smile, a statue's
strength,
Stands the mute sister. Patience,
nothing loth,
And both si^pporting, does the work
of both.
YOUTH AND AGE.
Yehse, a breeze, mid blossoms stray-
ing.
Where hope clung fading, like a
bee —
Both were mine ! Life went a-maying
With Natiu-e, Hope, and Poesy,
When I was young !
When I was young? — Ah, woful
when!
Ah! for the change 'twixt Now and
Then!
This breathing house not built with
hands,
This body that does me grievous
wrong,
O'er aery cliffs and glittering sands,
How lightly then it flashed along: —
Like those trim skiffs, unknown of
yore.
On winding lakes and rivers wide.
That ask no aid of sail or oar.
That fear no spite of wind or tide!
Nought cared this body for wind or
weather
When youth and I lived in't togetlier.
Flowers are lovely ; Love is flower-
like;
Friendship is a sheltering tree;
O ! the joys, that came down sliower-
like,
Of Friendship, Love, and Liberty,
Ere I was old.
Ere I was old ? All, woful ere.
Which tells me. Youth's no longer
here !
Youth! for years so many and
sweet,
'Tis known, that thou and I were
one,
I'll think it but a fond conceit —
It cannot be. that thou art gone!
Thy vesper-bell hath not yettolled : —
And thou wert aye a masker bold !
What strange disguise hast now put
on.
To make believe, that thou art gone ?
1 see these locks in silvery slips.
This drooping gait, this altered size:
But springtide blossoms on thy lips.
And tears take sunshine from thine
eyes!
COLERIDGE.
141
Life is but thought: so think I
will
That Youth and I are house-mates
still.
Dew-drops are the gems of morning
But tlie tears of mournful eve !
Where no hope is, life's a warning
That only serves to make us grieve,
When we are old :
That only serves to make us grieve
With oft and tedious taking-leave,
Like some poor nigli-related guest,
That may not rudely be dismist.
Yet hath outstayed his welcome
while,
And tells the jest without the smile.
COMPLAINT AND REPROOF.
How seldom, friend! a good great
man inherits
Honor or wealth, with all his worth
and pains !
It soimds like stories from the land
of spirits.
If any man obtain that which he
merits,
Or any merit that which he obtains.
For shame, dear friend! renounce
tliis canting strain!
WTiat wouldst thou have a good
great man obtain ?
Place, titles, salary — a gilded chain —
Or throne of corses which his sword
hatli slain ? —
Greatness and goodness are not
means, but ends !
Hatla he not always treasures, always
friends.
The good great man? — three treas-
ures, love and light,
And calm thoughts, regular as in-
fant's breath; —
And three firm friends, more sure
than day and night —
Himself, his Maker, and the angel
Death.
LOVE.
Am. thoughts, all passions, all de-
lights,
Whatever stirs tills mortal frame,
All are but ministers of Love,
And feed his sacred flame.
Oft in my waking dreams do I
Live o'er again tliat happy hour.
When midway on the mount I lay.
Beside the ruined tower.
The moonshine, stealing o'er the
scene
Had blended with the lights of eve ;
And she was there, my hope, my joy,
My own dear Genevieve!
She leaned against the armed man,
The statue of the armed knight;
She stood and listened to my lay,
Amid the lingering light.
Few sorrows hath she of her own.
My hope! my joy! my Genevieve!
She loves me best, whene'er I sing
The songs that make her grieve.
I played a soft and doleful air,
1 sang an old and moving story —
An otd rude song, that suited well
That ruin wild and hoary.
She listened with a flitting blush.
With downcast eyes and modest grace ;
For well she knew, I could not choose
But gaze upon her face.
I told her of the knight that wore
Upon his shield a burning brand ;
And that for ten long years he wooed
The lady of the land.
I told her how he pined : and ah I
The deep, the low, the pleading tone
With which I sang another's love,
Interijreted my own.
She listened with a flitting blush,
With downcast eyes, and modest
grace ;
And she forgave me, that I gazed
Too fondly on her face!
142
COLLIER.
But when I told the cruel scorn
That crazed that bold and lovely
knight,
And that he crossed the mountain-
woods,
Nor rested day nor night:
That sometimes from the savage den,
And sometimes from the darksome
shade,
And sometimes starting up at once
In green and sunny glade, —
There came and looked him in the face
An angel beautiful and bright;
And that he knew it was a fiend.
This miserable knight !
And that luiknowing what he did.
He leaped amid a murderous band.
And saved from outrage worse than
death
The lady of the land ; —
And how she wept, and clasped his
knees ;
And how she tended him in vain —
And ever strove to expiate
The scorn that crazed his brain ; —
And that she nursed him in a cave ;
And how his madness went away.
When on the yellow forest-leaves
A dying man he lay ; —
His dying words — but when I reached
That tenderest strain of all the ditty
My faltering voice and pausing harp
Disturbed her soul with pity !
All impulses of soul and sense
Had thrilled my guileless Genevieve;
The music and the doleful tale.
The rich and balmy eve ;
And hopes, and fears that kindle
hope,
An undistinguishable throng,
And gentle wishes long subdued,
iSubdued and cherished long!
She wept with pity and delight,
She blushed with love and virgin
shame;
And like the murmvir of a dream,
I heard her breathe my name.
Her bosom heaved — she stepped
aside,
As conscious of my look she stept —
Then suddenly, with timorous eye
She fled to me and wept.
She half enclosed me with her arms,
She pressed me with a meek embrace ;
And bending back her head, looked
up.
And gazed upon my face.
'Twas partly love, and partly fear.
And partly 'twas a bashful art,
That I might rather feel than see.
The swelling of her heart.
I calmed her fears, and she was
calm.
And told her love with virgin pride;
And so I won my Genevieve,
My bright and beauteous bride.
Thomas Stephens Collier.
OFF LABRADOn.
The storm-wind moans through
branches bare;
The snow flies wildly through the air ;
The mad waves roar, as fierce and
high [sky.
Thev toss their crests against the
All dark and desolate lies the sand
Along the wastes of a barren
land;
And rushing on, with sheets flung
free,
A ship sails down from the north-
ern sea.
^
COLLIER.
148
With lips pressed hard the helms-
man stands.
Grasping the spokes with freezing
hands,
While white the reef lies in his path,
Swept by an ocean full of wrath.
The surf-roar in the blast is lost.
The foam-flakes by the wild wind tost
High up in air, no warning show,
Hid by the driving mass of snow.
With sudden bound and sullen grate.
The brave ship rushes to her fate,
And splintered deck and broken
mast
Make homage to the roaring blast.
Amid the waves, float riven plank.
And rope and sail with moisture dank ;
And faces gleaming stern and
white
Shine dimly in the storm-filled
night.
By some bright river far away,
Fond hearts are ■wondering where
they stay
Who sleep along the wave-washed
shore
And stormy reefs of Labrador.
AN OCTOBER PICTURE.
The purple grapes hang ready for the
kiss
Of red lips sweeter than their wine ;
And 'mid the turning leaves they
soon will miss.
The crimson apples shine.
Lazily through the soft and sunlit air
The great hawks fly, and give no
heed
To the sweet songsters, that toward
the fair.
Far lands of summer speed.
Along the hills wild asters bend to
greet
The roadside' s wealth of golden-rod ;
And by the fences the bright su-
machs meet
The morning light of God.
Slowly the shadows of the clouds
drift o'er
The hillsides, clad in opal haze.
Where gorgeous butterflies seek the
rich store
Of flower-sprent summer days.
All clad in dusted gold, the tall elms
stand
Just in the edges of the wood ;
And near, the chestnut sentinels the
land.
And shows its russet hood.
The maple flaunts its scarlet banners
where
The marsh lies clad in shining mist ;
The mountain oak shows, in the
clear, bright air.
Its crown of amethyst.
Where, like a silver line, the spark-
ling stream
Flows murmuring through the
meadows brown.
Amid the radiance, seeming a sad
dream,
A sailless boat floats down.
COMPLETE.
LiKK morning blooms that meet the
sun
With all the fragrant freshness won
From night's repose, and kiss of dew
Which the bright radiance glistens
through,
Such is the sweetness of thy lips,
AVhere love its sacred tribute sips :
Such is the glory of thine eyes,
Fiich with the soul's unsaid replies.
The snow that crowns the mountain
height, [white;
Through countless years of gleaming
The creamy blooms of orchard trees.
Full of the melody of bees ;
The cool, fresh sweetness of the sea;
All have a charm possessed by thee :
But each of these has one alone.
Whilst thou canst call them all thine
own.
COLLINS.
Mortimer Collins.
IN VIEW OF DEATH.
Xo; I shall pass into the Morning
Land
As now from sleep into the life of
morn ;
Live the new life of the new world,
unshorn
Of the swift brain, the executing
hand ;
See the dense darkness suddenly
withdrawn,
As when Orion's sightless eyes dis-
cerned the dawn.
I shall behold it; I shall see the
utter
Glory of sunrise heretofore un-
seen,
Freshening the woodland ways with
brighter green,
And calling into life all wings that
flutter.
All throats of music and all eyes of
light.
And driving o'er the verge the in-
tolerable night.
O virgin world ! O marvellous far
days!
No more with dreams of grief doth
love grow bitter, [glitter
Nor trouble dim the lustre wont to
In happy eyes. Decay alone decays :
A moment — death's dull sleep is
o'er; and we
Drink the immortal morning air
Earine.
LAST VERSES.
I HAVE been sitting alone
All day while the clouds went by,
While moved the strength of the
seas.
While a wind with a will of his own,
A poet out of the sky.
Smote the green harp of the trees.
Alone, yet not alone,
For I felt, as the gay wind whirled.
As the cloudy sky grew clear.
The touch of our Father half-known,
Who dwells at the heart of the world,
Yet who is always here.
William Collins.
ODE TO SIMPLICITY.
O THOU, by Nature taught
To breathe" her genuine thought.
In numbers warmly pure, and sweet-
ly strong;
Wlio first, on mountains wild.
In Fancy, loveliest child.
Thy babe, or Pleasure's, nursed the
powers of song!
Thou, who, with hermit heart,
Disdain'st the wealth of art.
And gauds, and pageant weeds, and
trailing pall;
But com'st a decent maid,
In Attic robe arrayed,
O chaste, unboastful nymph, to thee
I call!
O sister meek of Truth,
To my admiring youth.
Thy sober aid and native charms in-
fuse I
The flowers that sweetest breathe,
Though Beauty culled the wreath.
Still ask thy hand to range their or-
dered hues.
COLLINS.
145
Though taste, though genius, bless.
To some divine excess,
Faints the cold work till thou inspire
the whole ;
What each, wiiat all supply,
May court, may charm, our eye;
Thou, only thou, canst raise the
meeting soul !
Of these let others ask,
To aid some mighty task,
I only seek to find thy temperate vale ;
Where oft my reed might sound
To maids and shepherds round.
And all thy sons, O Nature, learn
my tale.
ODE TO THE BRAVE.
HoAV sleep the brave, who sink to
rest,
By all their country's wishes blessed !
When Spring, with dewy fingers cold ,
Eeturns to deck their hallowed mould.
She there shall dress a sweeter sod
Than Fancy's feet have ever trod.
By fairy hands their knell is rung ;
By forms unseen their dirge is sung;
There Honor comes, a pilgrim gray.
To bless the turf that wraps their
clay;
And Freedom shall awhile repair,
To dwell, a weeping hermit, there!
ON TRUE AND FALSE TASTE IN
MUSIC.
Discard soft nonsense in a slavish
tongue,
The strain insipid, and the thought
unknown ;
From truth and nature form the mi-
erring test ;
Be what is'manly, chaste, and good
the best !
'Tis not to ape the songsters of the
groves,
Through all the quivers of their wan-
ton loves;
'Tis not the enfeebled thrill, or war-
bled shake,
The heart can strengthen, or the soul
awake !
But where the force of energy is
found.
When the sense rises on the wings of
sound ;
When reason, with the charms of
music twined.
Through the enraptured ear informs
the mind ;
Bids generous love or soft compassion
glow.
And forms a tuneful Paradise below !
THE PASSIONS.
AN ODE FOR MUSIC.
When Music, heavenly maid, was
young,
While yet in early Greece she sung.
The Passions oft, to hear her shell.
Thronged around her magic cell.
Exulting, trembling, raging, fainting,
Possest beyond the Muse's painting;
By turns they felt the glowing mind
Disturbed, delighted, raised, refined:
Till once, 'tis said, when all were
fired.
Filled with fury, rapt, inspired,
From the supporting myrtles round
They snatched her instruments of
sound :
And, as they oft had heard apart
Sweet lessons of her forcefvd art,
Each (for Madness ruled the hour)
Would prove his own expressive
power.
First Fear his hand, its skill to try.
Amid the chords bewildered laid.
And back recoiled, he knew not why.
E'en at the sound himself had
made.
Next Anger rushed ; his eyes on fire.
In lightnings owned his secret
stings ;
In one rude clash he struck the lyre.
And swept with hurried hands the
strings.
With woful measures wan Despair
Low, sullen sounds his grief be-
guiled ;
A solemn, strange, and mingled air;
'Twas sad by fits, by starts 'twas
wild !
But thou, O Hope, with eyes so fair,
What was thy delighted measure"?
Still it whispered promised pleasure,
And bade the lovely scenes at dis-
tance hail !
Still would her touch the strain pro-
long;
And from the rocks, the woods, the
vale.
She called on Echo still, through all
the song;
And where her sweetest theme she
chose,
A soft responsive voice was heard
at every close.
And Hope enchanted smiled, and
waved her golden hair.
And longer had she smig; — but with
a frown.
Revenge impatient rose;
He threw his blood-stained sword, in
thunder, down;
And with a withering look.
The war-denouncing trumpet took.
And blew a blast so loud and dread,
AVere ne'er prophetic sounds so full
of woe !
And, ever and anon, he beat
The doubling drum, with furious
heat;
.\nd though sometimes, each dreary
pause between.
Dejected Pity, at his side.
Her soul-subduing voice applied.
Yet still he kept his wild unaltered
mien,
While each strained ball of sight
seemed bursting from his head.
Thy numbers. Jealousy, to nought
were fixed;
Sad proof of thy distressful state;
Of differing themes the veering song
was mixed ;
And now it courted Love, now rav-
ing called on Hate.
With eyes upraised, as one inspired,
Pale Melancholy sate retired ;
And, from her wild sequestered seat,
In notes by distance made more
sweet.
Poured through the mellow horn her
pensive soul :
And, dashing soft from rocks
around.
Bubbling runnels joined the sound;
Through glades and glooms the min-
gled measures stole.
Or, o'er some haunted stream, with
fond delay.
Round an holy calm diffusing,
Love of Peace. and lonely musing.
In hollow murmiirs died away.
ButO! how altered was its spright-
lier tone.
When Cheerfulness, a nymph of
healthiest hue.
Her bow across her shoulder flung.
Her buskins gemmed with morning
dew.
Blew an inspiring air, that dale and
thicket rung.
The hunter's call, to Faun and
Dryad known !
The oak-crowned Sisters, and their
chaste-eyed Queen,
Satyrs and sylvan boys were seen,
Peeping from forth their alleys
green :
Brown Exercise rejoiced to hear;
And Sport leapt up, and seized his
beechen spear.
Last came Joy's ecstatic trial:
He, with viny crown advancing.
First to the lively pipe his hand
addrest ;
But soon he saw the brisk awakening
viol.
Whose sweet entrancing voice he
loved the best ; .
They would have thought who heard
the strain
They saw, in Terape's vale, her
native maids.
Amidst the festal sounding shades,
To some unwearied minstrel dancing,
Wliile, as his flying fingers kissed the
strings,
COLLINS.
147
Love framed with Mirth a gay fan-
tastic round ;
Loose were her tresses seen, her
zone unbound ;
And he, amidst his frolic play,
As if lie would the channiug air
repay,
Shook thousand odors from his dewy
wings.
O Music! sphere-descended maid.
Friend of Pleasure, Wisdom's aid!
Why, goddess! why, to us denied.
Lay' St thou thy ancient lyre aside ?
As, in that loved Athenian bower.
You learned an all-commanding
power,
Thy mimic soul, O Nymph endeared,
Can well recall what then it heard;
Where is thy native simple heart,
Devote to Virtue, Fancy, Art '?
Arise, as in that elder time.
Warm, energetic, chaste, sublime!
Thy wonders, in that godlike age.
Fill thy recording sister's page —
'Tis said, and I believe the tale,
Thy humblest reed could more pre-
vail.
Had more of strength, diviner rage,
Than all which charms this laggard
age;
E'en all at once together found,
Cecilia's mingled world of sound —
O bid our vain endeavors cease ;
Revive the just designs of Greece:
Keturn in all thy simple state!
( 'onfirm the tales her sons relate !
ODE TO EVENING.
If aught of oaten stop or pastoral
song.
May hope, chaste Eve, to soothe thy
modest ear.
Like thy own brawling springs.
Thy springs and dying gales;
O nymph reserved, while now the
bright-haired sun
Sits in yon western tent, whose cloudy
skirts,
With brede ethereal wove
O'erhang his wavy bed:
Now air is hushed, save where the
weak-eyed bat
With short shrill shriek flits by on
leathern wing;
Or where the beetle winds
His small but sullen horn.
As oft he rises 'midst the twilight
path.
Against the pilgrim borne in heedless
hum :
Now teach me, maid composed.
To breathe some softened strain,
Whose numbers, stealing through thy
darkening vale,
May not unseemly with its stillness
suit;
As, musing slow, I hail
Thy genial loved return !
For when thy folding-star, arising
shows
His paly circlet, — at his warning lamp
The fragrant Hours, and elves
Who slept in buds the day,
And many a nymph who wreathes
her brows with sedge,
And sheds the freshening dew, and.
lovelier still.
The pensive Pleasiu-es sweet.
Prepare thy shadowy car.
Then let me ro've some wild and
heathy scene;
Or find some ruin, 'midst its dreary
dells.
Whose walls more awful nod
By thy religious gleams.
Or, if chill blustering winds, or driv-
ing rain
Prevent my willing feet, be mine the
hut,
That, from the mountain's side.
Views wilds, and swelling floods,
And hamlets brown, and dim-discov-
ered spires;
And hears their simple bell, and
marks o'er all
Thy dewy fingers draw
The gradual dusky veil.
148
COLLINS.
While Spring shall pour his showers
as oft he wont,
And bathe thy breathing tresses,
meekest Eve!
While Summer loves to sport
Beneath thy lingering light;
While sallow Autumn fills thy lap
with leaves;
Or Winter, yelling through the troub-
lous air.
Affrights thy shrinking train,
And rudely rends thy robes;
So long, regardful of thy quiet rule.
Shall Fancy, Friendship, Science,
smiling Peace,
Thy gentlest Influence own.
And love thy favorite name !
ODE ON THE DEATH OF THOMSON.
[The scene is supposed to lie on the
Thames, near RichiiKnid.]
In yonder grave a Druid lies.
Where slowly v/inds the stealing
wave ;
The year's best sweets shall duteous
rise
To deck its poet's sylvan grave.
In yon deep bed of whispering reeds
His airy harp shall now be laid.
That he, whose heart in sorrow
bleeds.
May love through life the soothing
shade.
Then maids and youths shall linger
here,
And while its sounds at distance
swell.
Shall sadly seem in Pity's ear
To hear the woodland pilgrim's
knell.
Remembrance oft shall haunt the
shore
When Thames in summer wreaths
is drest,
And oft suspend the dashing oar,
To bid his gentle spirit rest !
And oft, as Ease and Health retire
To breezy lawn, or forest deep,
The friend shall view yon whitening
spire
And 'mid the varied landscape
weep.
But thou, who own'st that earthly
bed.
Ah! what will every dirge avail;
Or tears, which Love and Pity shed,
That mourn beneath the gliding
sail ?
Yet lives there one whose heedless
eye
Shall scorn thy pale shrine glim-
mering near ?
With him, sweet bard, may Fancy die.
And Joy desert the blooming year.
But thou, lorn stream, whose sullen
tide
No sedge-crowned sisters now at-
tend,
Now waft me from the green hill's
side,
Whose cold turf hides the biu'ied
friend !
And see, the fairy valleys fade;
Dun night has veiled the solemn
view !
Yet once again, dear parted shade.
Meek Nature's child, again adieu!
The genial meads, assigned to bless
Thy life, shall mourn thy early
doom ;
Their hinds and shepherd-girls shall
dress,
With simple hands, thy rural tomb.
Long, long, thy stone and pointed
clay
Shall meltthe musing Briton's eyes :
"O vales and wild woods!"' shall he
say,
' ' In yonder grave your Druid lies I ' '
COOK.
149
Eliza Cook.
SONG OF 'THE HE MP SEED.
Ay, scatter me well, 'tis a moist spring
day;
Wide and far be the hempseed sown:
And bravely I'll stand on the autumn
land,
When the rains have dropped and
the winds have blown
Man shall carefully gather me up;
His hand shall rule and my form
shall change;
Not as a mate for the purple of state,
Nor into aught that is "rich and
strange."
But 1 will come forth all woven and
spun,
With my fine threads curled in ser-
pent length ;
And the fire-wrought chain and the
lion's thick mane
Shall be rivalled by me in mighty
strength.
I have many a place in the busy world.
Of triumph and fear, of sorrow and
Joy;
I carry the freeman's flag unfurled;
I am linked to childhood's darling
toy.
Then scatter me wide, and hackle me
well ;
For a varied tale can the hempseed
tell.
Bravely I swing in the anchor-ring,
Where the foot of the proud man
cometh not;
WTiere the dolphin leaps and the sea-
weed creeps
O'er the rifted sand and the coral
grot.
Down, down below I merrily go
When the huge ship takes her rock-
ing rest :
The waters may chafe, but she dwell-
eth as safe
As the young bird in its woodland
nest.
I wreathe the spars of that same fair
ship, [about:
Where the gallant sea-hearts cling
Springing aloft with a song on the lip,
Putting their faith in the cordage
stout,
I am true when the blast sways the
giant mast,
Straining and stretched in a nor'-
west gale,
I abide with the bark, in the day and
the dark,
Lashing the liammock and reefing
the sail.
f)h ! the billows and I right fairly
cope,
And the wild tide is stemmed by the
cable rope.
The sunshine falls on a new-made
grave, —
The funeral train is long and sad;
The poor man has come to the hap-
piest home
And easiest pillow he ever had.
I shall be there to lower him down
Gently into his narrow bed ;
I shall be there, the work to share.
To guard his feet, and cradle his
head.
Oh ! the hempseed cometh in doleful
shape.
With the mourner's cloak and sable
crape.
Harvest shall spread with its glitter-
ing Avheat,
The barn shall be opened, the stack
shall be piled ;
Ye shall see the ripe grain shining
out from the wain.
And the berry-stained arms of the
gleaner-child.
Heap on, heap on, till the wagon-
ribs creak,
Let the sheaves go towering to the
sky;
Up with the shock till the broad
wheels rock.
Fear not to carry the rich freight
high;
For I will infold the tottermg gold,
I will fetter the rolling load;
Not an ear shall escape my binding
hold,
On the furrowed field or jolting
road.
Oh! the hempseed hath a fair place
to fill,
With the harvest band on the corn-
crowned hill.
AFTER A MOTHER'S DEATH.
TiiEY told me in my earlier years,
Life was a dark and tangled web; *
A gloomy sea of bitter tears,
Where Sorrow's influx had no ebb.
But such was vainly taught and said.
My laugh rang out with joyous tone ;
The woof possessed one brilliant
thread
Of rainbow colors, all my own.
I boasted — till a mother's grave
Was heaped and sodded — then I
foimd
The sunshine stricken from the wave.
And all the golden thread unwound.
Preach on who will — say "Life is
sad,"
I'll not refute as once I did;
You'll find the eye that beamed so
glad,
Will hide a tear beneath its lid.
Preach on of woe; the time liatli been
I'd praise the world with shadeless
brow :
The dream is broken — I have seen
A mother die: — I'm silent now.
GANGING TO AND GANGING FRAE.
Nae star was glintin out aboon,
The cluds were dark and hid the
moon ;
The whistling gale was in my teeth.
And round me was the deep snaw
wreath ;
But on I went the dreary mile.
And simg right cantie a' the while
I gae my plaid a closer fauld ;
My hand was warm, my heart was
bauld,
I didna heed the storm and cauld,
While ganging to my Katie.
But when I trod the same way back.
It seemed a sad and waef u' track ;
The brae and glen were lone and lang;
I didna sing my cantie sang;
I felt how sharp the sleet did fa'.
And couldna face the wind at a'.
Oh, sic a change! how could it be ?
I ken fu' well, and sae may ye —
The sunshine had been gloom to nie
While ganging./V<((' my Katie.
MY OLD STRAW HAT.
Fareweli^, old friend, — we part at
last;
Fruits, flowers, and summer, all are
past.
And when the beech-leaves bid adieu.
My old straw hat must vanish too.
We've been together many an hour,
In grassy dell and garden bower;
And plait and riband, scorched and
torn.
Proclaim how Avell thou hast been
worn.
We've had a time, gay, bright, and
long ;
So let me "sing a grateful song. —
And if one bay-leaf falls to me,
I'll stick it firm and fast in thee,
My old straw hat.
Thy flapping shade and flying strings
Are worth a thousand close-tied
things.
I love thy easy-fitting crown.
Thrust lightly back, or slouching
down.
I cannot brook a muffled ear,
Wlien lark and blackbird whistle
near ;
And dearly like to meet and seek
The fresh wind with unguarded
cheek.
COOKE.
151
Tossed in a tree, thou "It bear no
harm ;
Flung on the moss, thou "It lose no
charm ;
Like many a real friend on earth,
Rough usage only proves thy worth,
JNly old straw hat.
Farewell, old friend, thy work is done ;
The misty clouds shut out the sun;
The grapes are plucked, the hops are
- off.
The woods are stark, and I must doff
My old straw hat — but "bide a
wee,"
Fair skies we've seen, yet we may see
Skies full as fair as those of yore,
And then we'll wander forth once
more.
Farewell, till drooping bluebells blow.
And violets stud the warm hedgerow ;
Farewell, till daisies deck the plain —
Farewell, till spring days come again —
My old straw hat.
SONG OF THE UGLY MAIDRX.
Oh ! the world gives little of love or
light.
Though my spirit pants for much ;
For 1 have no beauty for the sight,
No riches for the touch.
1 hear men sing o'er the flowing cup
Of woman's magic spell;
And vows of zeal they offer up,
And eloquent tales they tell.
They bravely swear to guard the fair
With strong protecting arms ;
But will they worship woman's worth
Unblent with woman's charms?
No! ah, no! 'tis little they prize
Crook-backed forms and rayless eyes.
Oh! 'tis a saddening thing to be
A poor and ugly one;
In the sand Time puts in his glass
for me.
Few golden atoms run.
For my drawn lids bear no shadowing
fringe ;
My locks are thin and dry;
My teeth wear not the rich pearl tinge,
Nor my lips the henna dye.
I know full well I have nought of
grace
That maketli woman ''divine;"
The wooer's praise and doting gaze
Have never yet been mine.
Where'er I go all eyes will shun
The loveless mien of the ugly one.
Would that I had passed away
Ere I knew that I was born ;
For I stand in the blessed light of day
Like a weed among the corn, —
The black rock in the wide blue sea, —
The snake in the jungle green:
Oh! who will stay in the fearful way
Where such ugly things are seen?
Yet mine is the fate of lonelier state
Than that of the snake or rock ;
For those who behold me in their
path
Not only shun, but mock.
O Ugliness! thy desolate pain
Had served to set the stamp on ("ain!
Philip Pendleton Cooke.
FLORENCE VANE.
I LOVED thee long and dearly,
Florence Vane:
My life's bright dream and early
Hath come again;
I renew, in my fond vision.
My heart's dear pain —
My hopes, and thy derision,
Florence Vane.
The ruin, lone and hoary,
The ruin old
Where thou didst hark my story,
At even told —
That spot — the hues Elysian
Of sky and plain —
I treasure in my vision,
Florence Vane.
152
COOKE.
Thou wast lovelier than the roses
In their prime;
Thy voice excelled the closes
Of sweetest rhyme ;
Thy heart was as a river
Without a main.
Would I had loved thee never,
* Florence Vane.
But, fairest, coldest wonder!
Thy glorious clay
Lieth the green sod luider —
Alas, the day !
And it boots not to remember
Thy disdain,
To quicken love's pale ember,
Florence Vane.
The lilies of the valley
By young graves weep ;
The daisies love to dally
Where maidens sleep.
May their bloom, in beauty vying,
Never wane
Where thine earthly part is lying,
Florence Vane!
Rose Terry Cooke.
THE ICONOCLAST.
A THOUSAND years shall come and
go,
A thousand years of night and day;
And man, through all their changing
show.
His tragic drama still shall play.
Ruled by some fond ideal's power.
Cheated by passion or despair,
Still shall he waste life's trembling
hour.
In worship vain, and useless
prayer.
Ah! where are they who rose in
might,
Who tired the temple and the
shrine.
And hurled, through earth's chaotic
night.
The helpless gods it deemed di-
vine?
Cease, longing soid, thy vain desire!
What idol, in its stainless prime,
But falls, untouched of axe or tire.
Before the steady eyes of Time ?
He looks, and lo! our altars fall,
The shrine reveals its gilded clay,
With decent hands we spread the
pall.
And cold, with M'isdom, glide away.
O, where were courage, faith, and
truth.
If man went wandering all his day
In golden clouds of love and youth.
Nor knew that both his steps be-
tray ?
Come, Time, while here we sit and
wait.
Be faithful, spoiler, to thy trust!
No death can further desolate
The soul that knows its god was
dust.
TRAILING ARBUTUS.
Darlings of the forest!
Blossoming, alone.
When Earth's grief is sorest
For her jewels gone —
Ere the last snow-drift melts, your
tender buds have blown.
Tinged with color faintly,
Like the morning sky.
Or. more pale and saintly,
W^ rapped in leaves ye lie —
Even as children sleep in faith's sim-
plicity.
There the wild wood-robin,
Hymns your solitude ;
COOLBBITH.
153
And the rain comes sobbing
Through the budding wood,
While the low south wind sighs, but
dare not be more rude.
Were your pure lips fashioned
Out of air and dew —
Starlight unimpassioned,
Dawn's most tender hue,
And scented by the woods that gath-
ered sweets for you ?
Fairest and most lonely,
From the woi'ld apart ;
Made for beauty only.
Veiled from Nature's heart
With such unconscious grace as
makes the dream of Art!
Were not mortal sorrow
An immortal shade.
Then would I to-morrow
Such a flower be made,
And live in the dear woods where my
lost childhood played.
THEN.
I GIVE thee treasures hour by hour,
That old-time princes asked in vain.
And pined for. in their useless power,
Or died of passion's eager pain.
1 give thee love as God gives light,
Aside from merit, or from prayer.
Rejoicing in its own delight.
And freer than the lavish air.
I give thee prayers, like jewels strung
On golden threads of hope and f^ar;
And tenderer thoughts than ever
hung
In a sad angel's pitying tear.
As earth pours freely to the sea
Her thousand streams of wealth un-
told,
So flows my silent life to thee,
Glad that its very sands are gold.
What care I for thy carelessness ?
I give from depths that overflow.
Regardless that their power to bless
Tliy spirit cannot sound or know.
Far lingering on a distant dawn
My triumph shines, more sweet than
late;
When from these mortal mists with-
drawn,
Thy heart shall know me — I can
wait.
INA D. COOLBRITH.
IJV BLOSSOM TIME.
It's O my heart, my heart,
To be out in the sun and sing!
To sing and shout in the fields .about,
In the balm and the blossoming.
Sing loud, O bird in the tree;
O bird, sing loud in the sky.
And honey-bees, blacken the clover
bed —
There are none of you glad as I.
The leaves laugh low in the wind.
Laugh low, with the wind at play ;
And the odorous call of the flowers all
Entices my soul away!
For oh, but the world is fair, is fair —
And oh, but the world is sweet!
I will out in the gold of the blossom-
ing mould.
And sit at the Master's feet.
And the love my heart would speak
I will fold in the lily's rim.
That the lips of the blossoms, more
pure and meek,
May offer it up to Him.
COTTON.
Then sing in the hedgerow green, O
thrusli,
O skylark, sing in the blue:
Sing loud, sing clear, that the King
may hear,
And my soul shall sing with you!
THE MOTHER'S GRIEF.
So fair the sun rose yestermorn,
The mountain cliffs adorning;
The golden tassels of the corn
Danced in the breath of morning;
The cool, clear stream that runs be-
fore.
Such happy words was saying.
And in the open cottage door
My pretty babe was playing.
Aslant the sill a sunbeam lay:
I laughed in careless pleasure.
To see his little hand essay
To grasp the shining treasure.
To-day no shafts of golden flame
Across the sill are lying;
To-day I call my baby's name.
And hear no lisped replying;
To-day — ah, baby mine, to-day -
God holds thee in his keeping!
And yet I weep, as one pale ray
Breaks in upon thy sleeping —
I weep to see its shining bands
Reach, with a fond endeavor.
To where the little restless hands
Are crossed in rest forever!
Charles Cotton.
[From Retirement .'\
JN THE QUIET OF NATURE.
Farewell, thou busy world, and
may
We never meet again ;
Here I can eat, and sleep, and
pray, [day.
And do more good in one short
Than he who his whole age out-
wears
Upon the most conspicuous theatres,
Where nought but vanity and vice
appears.
Good God ! how sweet are all things
here !
How beautifid the fields appear!
How cleanly do we feed and lie !
Lord ! what good hours do we keep !
How quietly we sleep !
What peace, what luianimity!
How innocent from the lewd fashion,
Is all our business, all our recreation !
Dear solitude, the soul's best
friend,
That man acquainted with himself
dost make.
And all his Maker's wonders to in-
tend.
With thee I here converse at
will,
And would be glad to do so still.
For it is thou alone that keep'st the
soul awake.
How calm and quiet a delight
Is it, alone
To read, and meditate, and write.
By none offended, and offending
none!
To walk, ride, sit, or sleep at one's
own ease;
And, pleasing a man's self, none
other to displease.
CON TEN TA TI ON.
I CAN go nowhere but I meet
With malcontents and nnUineers,
As if in life was nothing sweet,
And we must blessings reap In
teai's.
Titles and wealth are fortune's toils,
Wherewith the vain themselves
ensnare :
The great are proud of borrowed
spoils,
The miser's plenty breeds his care.
The drudge who would all get, all
save,
Like a brute beast, both feeds and
lies;
Prone to the earth, he digs his
grave,
And in the very labor dies.
Excess of ill-got, ill-kept pelf
Does only death and danger breed;
Whilst one rich worldling starves
himself
With what would thousand others
feed.
Nor is he happier than these,
Who, in a moderate estate.
Where he might safely live at ease,
Has lusts that are immoderate.
Nor is he happy who is trim,
Tricked up in favors of the fair,
Mirrors, with every breath made
dim, [snare.
Birds, caught in every wanton
Woman, man's greatest woe or bliss.
Does oftener far than serve, en-
slave;
And with the magic of a kiss [save.
Destroys whom she was made to
There are no ills but what we make
By giving shapes and names to
things, —
Which is the dangerous mistake
That causes all our sufferings.
We call that sickness which is
health.
That persecution which is grace.
That poverty which is true wealth.
And that dishonor which is praise.
Alas ! our time is here so short
That in what state soe'er 't is
spent.
Of joy or woe, does not import.
Provided it be innocent.
But we may make it pleasant too.
If we will take our measures right,
And not what heaven has done undo
By an unruly appetite.
The world is full of beaten roads,
But yet so slippery withal,
That where one walks secure, 't is
odds
A hundred and a hundred fall.
Untrodden paths are then the best.
Where the frequented are unsure ;
And he comes soonest to his rest
Whose journey has been most se-
cure.
It is content alone that makes
Our pilgrimage a pleasure here;
And who buys sorrow cheapest takes
An ill commodity too dear.
Abraham
OF MYSELF.
This only grant me, that my means
may lie [liigh.
Too low for envy, for contempt too
Some honor I would have.
Not from great deeds, but good alone;
The unknown are better than ill
known :
Rumor can ope the grave.
Cowley.
Acquaintance I would have, but
when't depends
Not on the number, but the choice,
of friends.
Books should, not business, entertain
the light.
And sleep as undisturbed as death,
the night.
My house a cottage more
156
COWLEY.
Than palace ; and should fitting be
For all my use, no luxury.
My garden painted o'er
With Nature's hand, not Art's; and
pleasures yield,
Horace might envy in his Sabine
field.
Thus would I double my life's fading
space ;
For he that runs it well twice runs
his race.
And in tliis true delight,
These unbought sports, this happy
state,
I would not fear, nor wish, my fate;
But boldly say each night.
To-morrow let my sun his beams dis-
play,
Or in clouds hide them ; I have lived
to-day.
ON THE SHORTNESS OF LIFE.
Mark that swift arrow, how it cuts
the air.
How it outruns thy following eye !
Use all persuasions now, and try
If thou canst call it back or stay it
there,
That way it went; but thou shalt
find
iSTo track is left behind.
Fool! 'tis thy life, and the fond arch-
er, thou!
Of all the time thou'st shot
away,
I'll bid thee fetch but yesterday.
And it shall be too hard a task to do.
Beside repentance, what canst
find
That it hath left behind ?
But his past life, Avho without grief
can see.
Who never thinks his end too
near.
But says to Fame, Thou art
mine heir, —
That man extends life's natural
brevity :
This is, this is the only way
To outlive Nestor in a day.
I
[From Beaso7i.]
REASON AN AID TO REVELATION.
Though Reason cannot through
Faith's mysteries see,
It sees that there and ^uch there be,
Leads to heaven's door, and then
does humbly keep.
And then through chinks and key-
holes peep.
Though it, like Moses, by a sad com-
mand
Must not come into the Holy Land,
Yet thither it infallibly does guide,
And from afar 'tis all descried.
[From Friendship in Absence.]
DISTANCE NO BARRIER TO THE
SOUL.
When chance or cruel business parts
us two.
What do our souls, I wonder, do ?
Whilst sleep does our dull bodies tie,
Methinks at home they should not
stay
Content with dreams, — but boldly fly
Abroad, and meet each other half
the way.
'Twere an ill world, I'll swear, for
eveiy friend.
If distance could their union end :
But love itself does far advance
Above the power of time and space,
It scorns such outward circumstance,
His time 's forever, everywhere his
place.
LIGHT SHINING OUT OF
DAIIKNESS.
God moves in a mysterious way
His wonders to perform ;
He plants his footsteps in the sea,
And rides upon the storm.
Deep in unfatliomable mines
Of never-failing skill,
He treasures up His bright designs,
And works His sovereign will.
Ye fearful saints, fresh courage take.
The clouds ye so much dread
Are big with mercy, and shall break
In blessings on your head.
Judge not the Lord by feeble sense.
But trust Him for His grace ;
Behind a frowning providence
He hides a smiling face.
His purposes will ripen fast.
Unfolding every hoiu-;
The bud may have a bitter taste.
But sweet will be the flower.
Blind unbelief is sure to err.
And scan His work in vain :
God is His own interpreter.
And He will make it plain.
THE POPLAR FIELD.
The poplars are felled; farewell to
the shade,
And the whispering sound of the
cool colonnade!
The winds play no longer and sing in
the leaves,
Nor Ouse on his bosom their image
receives.
Twelve years have elapsed since I
first took a view
Of my favorite field, and the bank
where they grew;
And now in the grass behold they
are laid,
And the tree is my seat that once
lent me a shade !
The blackbird has fied to another re-
treat,
Wliere the hazels afford him a screen
from the heat,
And the scene where his melody
charmed me before
Resounds with his sweet-flowing
ditty no more.
My fugitive years are all hasting
away.
And I must ere long lie as lowly as
they.
With a turf on my breast, and a
stone at my head.
Ere another such grove shall arise in
its stead.
'Tis a sight to engage me, if any-
thing can.
To muse on the perishing pleasures
of man ;
Though his life be a dream, his en-
joyments, 1 see.
Have a being less durable even than
he.
[From The Task.]
APOSTROPHE TO POPULAR
APPLAUSE.
O POPULAR applause! what heart
of man
Is proof against thy sweet seducing
charms ?
The wisest and the best feel urgent
need
Of all their caution in thy gentlest
gales ;
But swelled into a gust — who then,
alas !
158
COW PER.
With all his canvas set, and inexpert,
And therefore heedless, can with-
stand thy power ?
Praise from the rivelled lips of tooth-
less, bald
Decrepitude, and in the looks of
lean
And craving poverty, and in the bow
Respectful of the smutched artificer,
Is oft too welcome, and may much
disturb
The bias of the iiurpose. How
much more
Poured forth by beauty splendid and
polite,
In language soft as adoration
breathes ?
Ah, spare your idol! think him hu-
man still;
(.'harms he may have, but he has
frailties too;
Dote not too much, nor spoil what ye
admire.
\_From The Task.]
THE FREEDOM OF THE GOOD.
He is the freeman whom the truth
makes free.
And all are slaves beside. There's
not a chain
That hellish foes confederate for his
harm
Can wind around him, but he casts
it off
With as nuicli ease as Samson his
green withes.
He looks abroad into the varied field
Of nature, and though poor perhaps,
compared
AVith those whose mansions glitter
in his sight,
Calls the delightful scenery all his
own.
His are the movmtains, and the val-
leys his,
And the I'esplendent rivers".
Yes — ye may fill your garners, ye
that reap
The loaded soil, and ye may waste
much good
In senseless riot; but ye will not find
In feast or in the chase, in song or
dance,
A liberty like his, who unimpeached
Of usurpation, and to no man's
wrong,
Appropriates nature as his Father's
work.
And has a richer use of yours, than
you.
He is indeed a freeman; free by birth
Of no mean city, planned or e'er the
hills
Were built, the fountains opened, or
the sea
With all his roaring multitude of
waves.
His freedom is the same in every
state ;
And no condition of this changeful
life,
ISo manifold in cares, whose every
day
Brings its own evil with it, makes it
less :
For he has wings that neither sick-
ness, pain.
Nor penury can cripple or confine.
No nook so narrow but he spreads
them there
With ease, and is at large. The op-
pressor holds
His body bound, but knows not
what a range
His si^irit takes, unconscious of a
chain.
And that to bind him is a vain at-
tempt
Whom God delights in, and in
whom he dwells.
[From The Task-.]
THE WIN^TER'S EVENING.
Now stir the fire, and close the shut-
ters fast,
Let fall the curtains, wheel the sofa
round.
And, Avhile the bubbling and loud-
hissing urn
Throws up a steamy column, and
the cups.
COWFER.
159
That cheer but not inebriate, wait on
each,
So let us welcome peaceful evening in.
Not such his evening, who with shin-
ing face
Sweats in the crowded theatre, and,
squeezed
And bored with elbow-points through
both his sides,
Outscolds the ranting actor on the
stage :
Nor his, who patient stands till his
feet throb.
And his head thumps, to feed upon
the breath
Of patriots, bursting with heroic rage.
Or placemen, all tranquillity and
smiles.
This folio of four pages, happy work!
Which not even critics criticize; that
holds
Inquisitive attention, while I read.
Fast bound in chains of silence, which
the fair,
Though eloquent themselves, yet fear
to break;
What is it but a map of busy life,
Its fluctuations, and its vast concerns?
'Tis pleasant, through the loopholes
of retreat,
To peep at such a world ; to see the
stir
Of the great Babel, and not feel the
crowd ;
To hear the roar she sends through
all her gates
At a safe distance, where the dying
sound
Falls a soft murmur on the uninjured
ear.
Thus sitting, and surveying thus at
ease
The globe and its concerns, I seem
advanced
To some secure and more than mortal
height,
Tlaat liberates and exempts me from
them all.
It turns submitted to my view, turns
round
With all its generations ; I behold
The tumult, and am still. The sound
of war
Has lost its terrors ere It reaches me;
Grieves, but alarms me not. I movun
the pride
And avarice, that make man a wolf
to man;
Hear the faint echo of those brazen
throats.
By which he speaks the language of
his heart.
And sigh, but never tremble at the
sound.
He travels and expatiates, as the bee
From flower to floAver, so he from
land to land ;
The manners, customs, policy, of all
Pay contribution to the store he
gleans ;
He sucks intelligence in every clime,
And spreads the honey of his deep
research
At his return, — a rich repast for me.
He travels, and I too. I tread his
deck,
Ascend his topmast, through his
peering eyes
Discover countries, with a kindred
heart
Suffer his woes, and share in his es-
capes ;
While fancy, like the flnger of a
clock,
Runs the great circuit, and is still at
home.
winter, ruler of the inverted year.
Thy scattered hair with sleet like
ashes filled.
Thy breath congealed upon thy lips,
thy cheeks
Fringed with a beard made white with
other snoMS
Than those of age. thy forehead
wrapi)ed in clouds,
A leafless branch thy sceptre, and
thy throne
A sliding car, indebted to no wheels.
But urged by storms along its slip-
pery way,
1 love thee, all unlovely as thou
seem'st,
And dreaded as thou art! Thou
hold'st the sun
A prisoner in the yet undawning
east.
Shortening his journey between morn
and noon.
And hurrying him, impatient of his
stay,
Down to the rosy west; but ]
^h
lQ-2
COWPER.
More precious than silver and gold,
Or all that this earth can afford.
But the soiuid of the church-going
bell,
These valleys and rocks never
heard,
Ne'er sighed at the sound of a knell,
Or smiled when a Sabbath ap-
peared.
Ye winds that have made me your
sport,
Convey to this desolate shore,
Some cordial endearing report
Of a land I shall visit no more.
My friends, do they now and then
send
A wish or a thought after me ?
O tell me I yet have a friend,
Though a friend I am never to see.
How fleet is the glance of the mind !
Compared with the speed of its
flight.
The tempest itself lags behind,
And the swift-winged arrows of
light.
When I think of my own native land,
In a moment I seem to be there;
But alas ! recollection at hand
Soon hurries me back to despair.
But the sea-fowl has gone to her nest,
The beast is laid down in his lair,
Even here is a season of rest,
And 1 to my cabin repair.
There's mercy in every place,
And mercy, encouraging thought !
Gives even affliction a grace.
And reconciles man to his lot.
TO MARY.
The twentieth year is Avell nigh past
Since first our sky was overcast ; —
Ah, would that this might be the last!
My Mary !
Thy spirits have a fainter flow,
I see thee daily weaker grow; —
' Twas my distress that brought thee
low,
My Mary !
Thy needles, once a shining store,
For my sake restless heretofore.
Now rust disused, and shine no more,
My Mary !
For though thou gladly wouldst fulfil
The same kind otlice for me still,
Thy sight now seconds not thy will,
My Mary !
But well thou play'dst the housewife's
part.
And all thy threads with magic art.
Have wound themselves about this
heart.
My Maiy !
Thy indistinct expressions seem
Like language uttered in a dream:
Yet me they charm, whate'er the
theme.
My Mary !
Thy silver locks, once auburn bright,
Are still more lovely in my sight
Than golden beams of orient light.
My Mary !
For could I view nor them nor thee,
What sight worth seeing could I
see ?
The sun would rise in vain for me.
My Mary !
Partakers of thy sad decline,
Thy hands their little force resign :
Yet gently pressed, press gently mine.
My Mary !
Such feebleness of limb thou provest.
That now at every step thou movest.
Upheld by two; yet still thou lovest.
My Mary !
And still to love, though pressed with
ill.
In wintry age to feel no chill.
With me is "to be lovely still.
My Mary I
But ah ! by constant heed I know.
How oft the sadness that I show
Transforms thy smiles to looks of woe !
My Mary !
And should my future lot be cast
With much resemblance of the past.
Thy worn-out heart will break at last,
My Mary!
CRABBE.
163
George Crabbe.
[From Edward Shore.]
THE PERILS OF GENIUS.
Genius ! thou gift of Heaven ! thou
light divine!
Amid wliat dangers art thou doomed
to sliine !
Oft will the body's weakness check
thy force.
Oft damp thy vigor, and impede thy
course ;
And trembling nerves compel thee to
restrain
Thy nobler efforts, to contend Avith
pain :
Or Want (sad guest!) will in thy pres-
ence come,
And breathe around her melancholy
gloom :
To life's low cares will thy proud
thought confine,
And make her sufferings, her impa-
tience thine.
Evil and strong, seducing passions
prey
On soaring minds, and win them from
their way,
Who then to Vice the subject spirits
give, [live:
And in the service of the conqueror
Like captive Samson making s^jort
for all,
Who feared their strength, and glo-
ry in tlieir fall.
Genius, with virtue, still may lack
the aid
Implored by humble minds, and
hearts afraid :
May leave to timid souls the shield
and sword
Of the tried Faitli and the resistless
Word ;
Amid a world of dangers venturing
forth.
Frail, but yet fearless, proud in con-
scious worth,
Till strong temptation, in some fatal
time.
Assails the heart, and wins the soul
to crime;
When left by honor, and by sorrow
spent,
Unused to pray, unable to repent,
The nobler powers that once exalted
high
Th' aspiring man shall then degraded
lie:
Reason, through anguish, shall her
throne forsake.
And strength of mind but stronger
madness make.
[From Edivard Shore.]
SLEEP THE DETRACTOR OF
BEAUTY.
We indeed have heard
Of sleeping beauty, and it has ap-
peared :
'Tis seen in infants — there indeed
we find.
The features softened by the slum-
bering mind ;
But other beauties, when disposed to
sleep.
Should from the eye of keen inspec-
tor keep:
The lovely nymph who would her
swain surprise,
May close her mouth, but not conceal
her eyes ;
Sleep from the fairest face some
beauty takes.
And all the homely features homelier
makes.
[From Edward Shore.]
THE VACILLATING PURPOSE.
Who often reads will sometimes wish
to write.
And Shore would yield instruction
and delight;
A serious drama he designed, but
found
'T was tedious travelling in that
gloomy ground;
CRABBE.
A deep and solemn story he would
try,
But grew ashamed of ghosts, and laid
it by;
Sermons he wrote, but they who knew
his creed,
Or knew it not, were ill disposed to
read ;
And he would lastly be the nation's
guide.
But, studying, failed to fix upon a
side;
Fame he desired, and talents he pos-
sessed,
But loved not labor, though he could
not rest,
Nor firmly fix the vacillating mind.
That, ever working, could no centre
find.
Then cares domestic rush upon his
mind.
And half the ease and comfort he
enjoys.
Is when surrounded by slates, books,
and boys.
[From Schools.']
THE TEACHER.
He, while his troop light-hearted leap
and play,
Is all intent on duties of the day;
No more the tyrant stern cv judge
severe.
He feels the father's and the hus-
band's fear.
Ah! little think the timid, trem-
bling crowd,
That one so wise, so powerful, and
so proud.
Should feel himself, and dread the
humble ills
Of rent-day charges and of coalmen's
bills;
That while they mercy from their
judge implore.
He fears himself — a knocking at the
door:
And feels the burden as his neighbor
states
His humble portion to the parish-
rates.
They sit the allotted hours, then
eager run,
Rushing to pleasure when the duty 's
done ;
His hour of pleasure is of different
kind.
[From Schools.]
LEARNING IS LABOR
To learning's second seats we now
proceed.
Where humming students gilded
primers read ;
Or books with letters large and pic-
tures gay.
To make their reading but a kind of
play —
■' Reading made Easy,' so the titles
tell:
But they who read must first begin
to spell :
There may be profit in these arts, but
still.
Learning is labor, call it what you
will;
Upon the youthful mind a heavy load.
Nor must we hope to find the royal
road.
Some will their easy steps to science
show.
And some to heaven itself their by-
way know ;
Ah ! trust them not, — who fame or
bliss would share,
Must learn by labor, and must live by
care.
[From, the Gentleman Farmer.]
FOLLY OF LITIGATION.
Who would by law regain his plun-
dered store.
Would pick up fallen mercury from
the floor;
If he pursue it, here and there it
slides,
He would collect it, but it more di-
vides;
CRABBE.
165
This part and this he stops, but still
in vain,
It slips aside, and breaks in parts
again ;
Till, after time and pains, and care
and cost,
He finds his labor and his object lost.
[From The Gentleman Farmer.']
AGAINST RASH OPINIONS.
When men in health against phy-
sicians rail,
They should consider that their
nerves may fail,
AVho calls a lawyer rogue, may find,
too late.
On one of these depends his whole
estate :
Nay, when the world can nothing
more produce.
The priest, the insulted priest, may
have his use ;
Ease, health, and comfort lift a man
so high,
These powers are dwarfs that he can
scarcely spy :
Pain, sickness, languor, keep a man
so low,
That these neglected dwarfs to giants
grow :
Happy is he who through the medium
sees
Of clear good sense.
[From The Parish Register.]
THE AlFFUL VACANCY.
Arrived at home, how then they
gazed around,
In every place, — where she — no
more \\as found ; —
The seat at table she was wont to fill :
The fireside chair, still set, but vacant
still:
The garden-walks, a labor all her own :
The latticed bower, with trailing
shrubs o'ergrown;
The Sunday pew she filled with all
her race, —
Each place of hers was now a sacred
place.
That, while it called up sorrows in
the eyes.
Pierced the full heart and forced them
still to rise.
O sacred Sorrow! by whom souls
are tried.
Sent not to punish mortals, but to
guide ;
If thou art mine, (and who shall
proudly dare
To tell his Maker he has had his
share ?)
Still let me feel for what thy pangs
Avere sent,
And be my guide and not my punish-
ment!
[From The Dumb Orators.]
MAN'S DISLIKE TO BE LED.
Man will not follow where a rule is
shown.
But loves to take a method of his
own ;
Explain the way with all your care
and skill.
This will he quit, if but to prove he
will.
[From The Villag,'.]
APOSTROPHE TO THE WHIMSI-
CAL.
Say, ye opprest by some fantastic
woes,
Some jarring nerve that baffles your
repose ;
Who press the downy couch while
slaves advance
AVith timid eye to read the distant
glance;
Who with sad prayers the weary doc-
tor tease.
To name the nameless ever-new
disease ;
166
CRABBE.
Who with mock patience dire com-
plaints endure,
Which real pain, and that alone can
cure ;
How would ye bear in real pain to lie,
Despised, neglected, left alone to die ?
How would ye bear to draw yoiu-
latest breath,
Where all that's wretched paves the
way for death ?
[From Prisons.]
THE CONDEMNED ; FflS DUE AM
AND ITS AWAKENING.
Stili- I behold him, every thought
employed
On one dire view! — all others are
destroyed;
This makes his features ghastly, gives
the tone
Of bis few words resemblance to a
groan ;
He takes his tasteless food, and when
't is done.
Counts up his meals, now lessened
by that one;
For expectation is on time intent,
AVhether he brings us joy or punish-
ment.
Yes! e'en In sleep the impressions
all remain,
He hears the sentence and he feels
the chain ;
He sees the judge and jury, when he
shakes.
And loudly cries, "Not guilty," and
awakes ;
Then chilling tremblings o'er his
body creep.
Till worn-out nature is compelled to
sleep.
Now conies the dream again: it
shows each scene.
With each small circumstance that
comes between —
The call to suffering and the very
deed —
There crowds go with him, follow,
and precede ;
Some heartless shout, some pity, all
condemn.
While he in fancied envy looks at
them :
He seems the place for that sad act to
see.
And dreams the very thirst which
then Mill be:
A priest attends — it seems, the one
he knew
In his best days, beneath whose care
he grew.
At this his terrors take a sudden
flight.
He sees his native village with de-
light:
The house, the chamber, where he
once arrayed
His youthful person; where he knelt
and prayed;
Then too the comforts be enjoyed at
home.
The days of joy : the joys themselves
are come ; —
The hours of innocence; — the timid
look
Of his loved maid, when first her
hand he took,
And told his hope; her trembling
joy appears.
Her forced reserve, and his retreat-
ing fears.
All now is present; — 'tis a mo-
ment's gleam
Of former sunshine — stay, delightful
dream !
Let him within his pleasant garden
walk.
Give him her arm; of blessings let
them talk.
Yes! all are with him uom', and all
the while
Life's early prospects and his Fan-
ny's smile:
Then come his sister, and his village-
friend.
And he will now the sweetest mo-
ments spend
Life has to yield ; — No ! never will he
find
Again on earth such pleasures in his
mind :
He goes through shrubby walks these
friends among.
Love in their looks and honor on
their tongue :
CRABBE.
167
Nay, there's a chann beyond what
nature shows.
The bloom is softer and more sweetly
glows ; —
Pierced by no crime, and urged by
no desire
For more than true and honest hearts
require,
They feel the calm delight, and thus
proceed,
Through the green lane, — then lin-
ger in the mead, —
Stray o'er the heath in ail its purple
bloom, —
And pluck the blossoms where the
wild bees hum ;
Then through the broomy bound with
ease they pass.
And press the sandy sheep walk's
slender grass
Where dwarfish flowers among the
gorse are spread.
And the lamb browses by the linnet's
bed;
Then 'cross the bounding brook they
make their way
O'er its rough bridge and there be-
hold the bay ! —
The ocean smiling to the fervid
sun —
The waves that faintly fall and slowly
run —
The ships at distance and the boats
at hand ;
And now they walk upon the sea-
side sand.
Counting the number and what kind
they be,
Ships softly sinking in the sleepy sea:
Now arm in arm, now parted, they
behold
The glittering waters on the shingles
rolled :
The timid girls, half dreading their
design,
Dip the small foot in the retarded
brine.
And search for crimson weeds, which
spreading flow.
Or lie like pictures on the sand below:
With all those bright red pebbles,
that the sun
Through the small waves so softly
shines upon ;
And those live lucid jellies which the
eye
Delights to trace as they swim glit-
tering by :
Pearl-shells and rubied star-fish they
admire,
And will arrange above the parlor
fire, —
Tokens of bliss! — " Oh! horrible! a
wave
Roars as it rises — save me, Edward I
save!"
She cries : — Alas ! the watchman on
his Avay
Calls, and lets in — truth, terror, and
the day !
[From The Lover's Journey.]
EXTERNAL IMPRESSIONS DEPEN-
DENT ON THE SOUL'S MOODS.
It is the Soul that sees: the out-
ward eyes
Present the object, but the Mind de-
scries ;
And thence delight, disgust, or cool
indifference rise:
When minds are joyful, then we look
around.
And what is seen is all on fairy
ground ;
Again they sicken, and on every view
Cast their own dull and melancholy
hue ;
Or, if absorbed by their peculiar cares,
The vacant eye on viewless matter
glares.
Our feelings still upon our views at-
tend,
And their own natures to the objects
lend ; [sure.
Sorrow and joy are in their influence
Long as the passion reigns th' effects
endure :
But Love in minds his various changes
makes,
And clothes each object with the
change he takes ;
His light and shade on every view
he throws.
And on each object, what he feels,
bestows.
168
CRABBE.
[From The Parting Hour.)
LIFE.
Minutely trace man's life: year
after year,
Through all his days let all his deeds
appear,
And then, though some may in that
life be strange,
Yet there appears no vast nor sudden
change:
The links that bind those various
deeds are seen.
And no mysterious void is left be-
tween.
But let these binding links be all
destroyed,
All that through years he suffered or
enjoyed :
Let that vast gap be made, and then
behold —
This was the youth, and he is thus
when old ;
Then we at once the work of time
survey.
And in an instant see a life's decay;
Pain mixed with pity in our bosoms
rise,
And sorrow takes new sadness from
surprise.
[From The Parting Hour.}
FRIENDSHIP IN AGE AND SORRO W.
Beneath yon tree, observe an an-
cient pair —
A sleeping man; a woman in her
chaii'.
Watching his looks with kind and
pensive air;
Nor wife, nor sister she, nor is the
name
Xor kindred of this friendly pair the
same ;
Yet so allied are they, that few can
feel
Her constant, warm, unwearied, anx-
ious zeal ;
Their years and woes, although they
long have loved.
Keep their good name and conduct
unreproved ;
Thus life's small comforts they to-
gether share,
And while life lingers, for the grave
prepai-e,
No other subjects on their spirits
press.
Nor gain such Interest as the past dis-
tress ;
Grievous events, that from the mem-
ory drive
Life's common cares, and those alone
survive.
Mix Avith each thought, in every ac-
tion share,
Darken each dream, and blend with
every prayer.
[From The Library.']
CONTIiO VERSIALIS TS.
Against her foes Religion well de-
fends
Her sacred truths, but often fears her
friends ;
If learned, their pride, if weak, their
zeal she dreads.
And their hearts' weakness who have
soimdest heads :
But most she fears the controversial
pen,
The holy strife of disputatious men ;
Who the blest Gospel's peaceful page
explore,
Only to tight against its precepts
more.
[From The Librarij.]
TO CRITICS.
Foes to our race! if ever ye have
known
A father's fears for offspring of your
own ;
If ever, smiling o'er a lucky line.
Ye thought the sudden sentiment di-
vine.
Then paused and doubted, and then
tired of doubt.
With rage as sudden dashed the stanza
out ; —
CRABBE.
169
If, after fearing much and pausing
long.
Ye ventured on the world yoiu' la-
bored song,
And from the crusty critics of those
days
Implored the feeble tribute of their
praise.
Remember now the fears that moved
you then,
And, spite of truth, let mercy guide
your pen.
[From The Library. "l
PHILOSOPHY.
How vice and virtue in the soul
contend ;
How widely differ, yet how nearly
blend ;
What various passions war on either
part,
And now confirm, now melt the
yielding heart:
How Fancy loves around the world
to stray.
While Judgment slowly picks his
sober way;
The stores of memory, and 'the
flights sublime
Of genius bound by neither space nor
time; —
All these divine Philosophy explores.
Till , lost in awe, she wonders and
adores.
[From The Library.]
THE UNIVERSAL LOT.
Care lives with all; no rules, no
preceiJts save
The wise from woe, no fortitude the
bra\e ;
Grief is to man as certain as the
grave :
Tempests and storms in life's whole
progress rise,
And hope shines dimly through o'er-
clouded skies;
Some drops of comfort on the favored
fall,
But showers of sorrow are the lot of
all :
Partial to talents, then, shall Heaven
withdraw
Th' afflicting rod, or break the general
law ?
Shall he who soars, inspired by loftier
views,
Life's little cares and little pains re-
fuse ?
Shall he not rather feel a double share
Of mortal woe, when doubly armed
to bear ?
[From The Library.]
UNION OF FAITH AND REASON
NECESSAR Y.
When first Religion came to bless
the land.
Her friends were then a firm believ-
ing band,
To doubt was then to plunge in guilt
extreme.
And all was gospel that a monk could
dream ;
Insulted Reason fled the grovelling
soul,
For Fear to guide, and visions to con-
trol ;
But now, when Reason has assumed
her throne,
She, in lier turn, demands to reign
alone;
Rejecting all that lies beyond her
view.
And, being judge, will be a witness
too:
Insulted Faith then leaves the doubt-
ful mind,
To seek the truth, without a power to
find:
Ah! when will both in friendly beams
unite.
And pour on erring man resistless
liiiht ?
170
CRAIK.
[From The Library.]
They soothe the grieved, the stub-
BOOKS.
born they chastise,
Fools they admonish, and confirm
the wise;
But what strange art, what magic
can dispose
The troubled mind to change its na-
Their aid they yield to all ; they never
shun
The man of sorrow, nor the wretch
tive woes ?
undone ;
Or lead us willing from ourselves, to
Unlike the hard, the selfish, and the
see
Others more wretched, more undone
proud,
They fly not sullen from the suppli-
than we ?
ant crowd ;
This BOOKS can do; — nor this alone ;
Nor tell to various people various
they give
New views to life, and teach us how
to live;
things.
But show to subjects what they show
to kings.
Dinah Mulock Craik.
GEE EX THINGS GROWING.
Oh, the green things growing, the
green things growing,
The faint sweet smell of the green
things growing!
I should like to live, whether I smile
or grieve.
Just to watcli the happy life of my
green things growing.
Oil, the fluttering and the pattering
of those green things growing!
How they talk each to each, when
none of us are knowing;
In the wonderful white of the weird
moonlight
Or the dim dreamy dawn when the
cocks are crowing.
I love, I love them so, — my green
things growing!
And I think that they love me, with-
out false showing;
For by many a tender touch, they
comfort me so mucli.
With the soft mute comfort of green
things growing.
And in the rich store of their blos-
soms glowing
Ten for one 1 take they're on me be-
stowing:
Oh, I should like to see, if God's will
it may be.
Many, many a sunmier of my green
things growing!
But if I must be gathered for the an-
gels' sowing.
Sleep out of sight awhile, like the
green things growing.
Though dust to dust return, I think
I'll scarcely mourn,
If I may change into green things
growing.
NOW AND AFTERWARDS.
"Two hands upon the breast.
And labor's done;
Two pale feet crossed in rest, —
The race is won;
Two eyes with coin-weights shut,
And all tears cease ;
PLIGHTED.
Page i/i.
CRAIK.
171
Two lips where grief is mute,
Anger at peace; "
So pray we oftentimes, mourning
our lot
God in his kindness answereth not.
" Two hands to work addrest
Aye for His praise;
Two feet that never rest
Walking His ways ;
Two eyes that look above
Through all their tears;
Two lips still breathing love.
Not wrath, nor fears; "
So pray we afterwards, low on oiu'
knees ;
Pardon those erring prayers! Father,
hear these!
PLIGHTED.
Mine to the core of the heart, my
beauty !
Mine, all mine, and for love, not
duty :
Love given willingly, full and free,
Love for love's sake, — as mine to
thee.
Duty's a slave that keeps the keys.
But Love, the master, goes in and out
Of his goodly chambers with song
and shout.
Just as he please, — just as he
please.
Mine, from the dear head's crown,
brown-golden.
To the silken foot that's scarce be-
holden ;
Give to a few friends hand or smile,
Like a generous lady, now and
awhile.
But the sanctuary heart, that none
dare win.
Keep holiest of holiest evermore;
The crowd in the aisles may watch
the door.
The high-priest only enters in.
Mine, my own, without doubts or
terrors,
With all thy goodnesses, all thy
errors.
ITnto me and to me alone revealed,
"A spring shut up, a fountain
sealed."
Many may praise thee, — praise
mine as thine.
Many may love thee, — I'll love them
too;
But thy heart of hearts, pure, faith-
ful, and true.
Must be mine, mine wholly, and
only mine.
Mine!— God, I thank Thee that
Thou hast given
Something all mine on this side
heaven :
Something as much myself to be
As this my soul which I lift to Thee:
Flesh of my flesh, bone of my bone ;
Life of my life, whom Thou dost
make
Two to the world for the world's
work's sake, —
But each unto each, as in Thy
sight, one.
PHILIP, MY KING.
Look at me with thy large brown
eyes,
Philip, my king.
Round whom the enshadowing pur-
ple lies
Of babyhood's royal dignities;
Lay on my neck thy tiny hand
With love's invisible sceptre laden
I am thine Esther to conmiand
Till thou shalt find a queen-hand-
maiden,
Philip, my king.
Oh, the day when thou goest a-woo-
ing,
Philip, my king!
When those beautiful lips are suing.
And some gentle heart's bars undoing
Thou dost enter, love-crowned, and
there
Sittest love-glorified. Pule kindly,
Tenderly, over thy kingdom fair,
For we that love, ah! we love so
blindly,
Philip, my king.
172
CRAIK.
Up from thy sweet mouth, — up to
thy brow,
Philip, my king!
The spirit that there lies sleeping
now
May rise like a giant and make men
bow
As to one heaven-chosen amongst
his peers:
My Saul, than thy brethren taller
and fairer
Let me behold thee in future years;
Yet thy head needeth a circlet rarer,
PhiliiJ, my king.
— A wreath not of gold, but palm.
One day,
Philip, my king,
Thou too must tread, as we trod, a
way
Thorny and cruel and cold and gray :
Rebels within thee and foes without.
Will snatcli at thy crown. But march
on, glorious.
Martyr, yet monarch; till angels
shout [victorious,
As thou sit'st at the feet of God
"Philip, the king!"
TOO LATE.
Could you come back to me, Douglas,
Douglas,
In the old likeness that I knew,
I would be so faithful, so loving,
Douglas,
Douglas, Douglas, tender and true.
Never a scornful word should grieve
you,
I'd smile on you sweet as the angels
do; —
Sweet as your smile on me shone
ever.
Douglas, Douglas, tender and true.
Oh, to call back the days that are not !
My eyes were blinded, your words
were few,
Do you know the truth now up in
heaven,
Douglas, Douglas, tender and true?
I never was worthy of you, Douglas ;
Not half worthy the like of you:
Now all men beside seem to me like
shadows, —
I love you, Douglas, tender and
true.
Stretch out your hand to me, Doug-
las, Douglas,
Drop forgiveness from heaven like
dew ;
As I lay my heart on your dead
heart, Douglas,
Douglas, Douglas, tender and true.
RESIGNING.
CuiLDiiEX, that lay their pretty gar-
lands by
So piteously, yet with a humble
mind;
Sailors, who, when their ship rocks
in the wind,
Cast out her freight with half-averted
eye,
Riches for life exchanging solemnly,
Lest they should never gain the
wished-f or shore ; —
Thus we, O Father, standing Thee
before,
Do lay down at Thy feet without a
sigh
Each after each our precious things
and rare,
Our dear heart-jewels and oiu- gar-
lands fair.
Perhaps Thou knewest that the flow-
ers would die,
And the long-voyaged hoards be
fomid but dust :
So took'st tlieni, while imchanged.
To Thee Me trust
For incorruptible treasure : Thou art
just.
MY LITTLE BOY THAT DIED.
Look at his pretty face for just one
minutt;!
His braided frock and dainty but-
toned shoes ;
GRANGH.
173
His firm-shut hand, the favorite
plaything in it, —
Then tell me, mothers, was't not
hard to lose
And miss him from my side,—
My little boy that died ?
How many another boy, as dear and
charming, [delight,
His father's hope, his mother's one
Slips through strange sicknesses, all
fear disarming,
And lives a long, long life in par-
ents' sight!
Mine was so short a pride !
And then, — my poor boy died.
I see him rocking on his wooden
charger ;
I hear him pattering through the
house all day ;
I watch his great blue eyes grow
large and larger, jor gay,
Listening to stories, whether grave
Told at the bright fireside.
So dark now, since he died.
But yet I often think my boy is liv-
ing,
As living as my other children are.
When good-night kisses I all round
am giving,
I keep one for him, though he is
so far.
Can a mere grave divide
Me from him,— though he died ?
So, while I come and plant it o'er
with daisies
(Nothing but childish daisies all
year round).
Continually God's hand the curtain
raises.
And I can hear his merry voice's
sound,
And feel him at my side, —
My little boy that died.
Christopher Pearse Cranch.
A THRUSH IN A GILDED CAGE.
Was this the singer I had heard so
long.
But never till this evening, face to
face?
And were they his, those tones so
unlike song.
Those words conventional and
commonplace ?
Those echoes of the usual social chat
That filled with noise confused the
crowded hall;
That smiling face, black coat, and
white cravat;
Those fashionable manners,— was
this all ?
He glanced at freed men, operas, pol-
itics.
And other common topics of the
day;
But not one brilliant image did he
mix
With all the prosy things he had to
say.
At least 1 hoped that one I long had
known.
In the inspired books that built his
fame,
Would breathe some word, some
sympathetic tone.
Fresh" from the ideal region whence
he came.
And so I leave the well-dressed, buzz-
ing crowd.
And vent my spleen alone here by
my fire;
Mourning the fading of my golden
cloud.
The disappointment of my life s
desire.
Simple enthusiast! why do you re-
quire
A budding rose for every thorny
stalk '?
Why must we poets always bear the
lyre
And sino;, when fashion forces us
to talk ?
Only at moments comes the muse's
light.
Alone, like shy wood-thrushes, war-
ble we.
Catch us in traps like this dull crowd
to-night,
We are but plain, brown -feathered
birds, you see!
COMPENSA TION.
Tears wash away the atoms in the
eye
That smarted for a day ;
Rain-clouds that spoiled the splen-
dors of the sky
The fields with flowers array.
No chamber of pain but has some
hidden door
That promises release ; [store
No solitude so drear but yields its
Of thought and inward peace.
No night so wild but brings the con-
stant sun
With love and power untold ;
No time so dark but through its woof
there run
Some blessed threads of gold.
And through the long and storm-tost
centuries burn
In changing calm and strife
The Pharos-lights of truth, where'er
we turn, —
The unquenched lamps of life.
O Love supreme! O Providence di-
vine!
What self-adjusting springs
Of law and life, what even scales,
are thine.
What sure-returning wings
Of hopes and joys that flit like birds
away,
When chilling autumn blows.
But come again, long ere the buds of
May
Their rosy lips unclose!
What wondrous play of mood and
accident
Through shifting days and years ;
What fresh returns of vigor overspent
In feverish dreams and fears!
AMiat wholesome air of conscience
and of thought
When doubts and forms oppress ;
What vistas opening to the gates we
sought
Beyond the wilderness;
Beyond the narrow cells where self-
involved.
Like chrysalids, Ave wait
The unknown births, the mysteries
unsolved
Of death and change and fate !
O Light divine! we need no fuller
test
That all is ordered well;
We know enough to trust that all is
best
Where Love and Wisdom dwell.
MEMORIAL HALL.
Amid the elms that interlace
Round Harvard's grounds their
branches tall,
We greet no walls of statelier grace
Than thine, our proud Memorial
Hall !
Through arching boughs and roofs of
green
Whose dappled lights and shadows
lie
Along the turf and road, is seen
Thy noble form against the sky.
And miles away, on fields and
streams,
Or M'here the woods the hilltop
crown.
The monumental temple gleams,
A landmark to each neighboring
town.
Nor this alone ; New England knows
A deeper meaning in the pride
Whose stately architecture shows
How Harvard's children fought
and died.
Therefore this hallowed pile recalls
The heroes, young and true and
brave.
Who gave their memories to these
walls.
Their lives to fill the soldier's
grave.
The farmer, as he drives his team
To market in the morn, afar
Beholds the golden sunrise gleam
Upon thee, like a glistening star.
And gazing, he remembers well
Why stands yon tower so fair and
tall.
Ills sons perhaps in battle fell ;
For him, too, shines Memorial
Hall.
And sometimes as the student glides
Along the winding Charles, and sees
Across the flats thy glowing sides
Above the elms and willow-trees.
Upon his oar he'll turn and pause,
Remembering the heroic aims
Of those who linked their country's
cause
In deathless glory with their names.
And as against the moonlit sky
The shadowy mass looms overhead,
Well may we linger with a sigh
Beneath the tablets of the dead.
The snow-drifts on thy roof shall
wreathe
Their crowns of virgin white for
them ;
The whispering winds of summer
breathe
At morn and eve their requiem.
For them the Cambridge bells shall
chime
Across the noises of the town ;
The cannon's peal recall their time
Of stern resolve and brief renown.
Concord and Lexington shall still.
Like deep to deep, to Harvard call;
The tall gray shaft on Bunker Hill
Speak greetings to Memorial Hall.
Oh, never may the land forget
Her loyal sons who died that we
Might live, remembering still our
debt.
The costly price of Liberty !
THOUGHT.
Thought is deeper than all speech,
Feeling deeper than all thought ;
Souls to souls can never teach
^\llat nnto themselves was taught.
We are spirits clad in veils;
Man by man was never seen;
All our deep communing fails
To remove the shadowy screen.
Heart to heart was never known ;
Mind with mind did never meet;
We are columns left alone
Of a temple once complete.
Like the stars that gem the sky,
Far apart though seeming near,
In our light we scattered lie;
All is thus but starlight here.
What is social company
lint a babbling summer stream ?
What oiu" wise philosophy
But the glancing of a dream '?
Only when the svin of love
Melts the scattered stars of thought.
Only when we live above
What the dim-eyed world hath
taught ;
176
CRANCH.
Only when our souls are fed
By the fount which gave them birth,
And by inspiration led
Which they never drew from earth,
We, like parted drops of rain,
Swelling till they meet and run,
Shall be all absorbed again.
Melting, flowing into one.
/ lyf THEE, AND THOU IN ME.
I AM but clay in thy hands, but Thou
art the all-loving artist.
Passive I lie in thy sight, yet in my
selfhood 1 strive
So to embody the life and the love
thou ever impartest,
That in my sphere of the finite, I
may be truly alive.
Knowing thou needest this form, as
I thy divine inspiration.
Knowing thou shapest the clay with
a vision and purpose divine,
So would I answer each touch of thy
hand in its loving creation.
That in my conscious life thy pow-
er and beauty may shine,
Reflecting the noble intent thou hast
in forming thy creatures ;
Waking from sense into life of the
soul, and the image of thee;
Working with thee in thy work to
model humanity's features
Into the likeness of God, myself
from myself I Mould free.
One with all human existence, no
one above or below me ;
Lit by thy wisdom and love, as
roses are steeped in the morn;
Growing from clay to a statue, from
statue to flesh, till thou know
me
Wrought into manhood celestial,
and in thine image re-born.
So in thy love will I trust, bringing
me sooner or later
Past the dark screen that divides
these shows of the finite from
thee.
Thine, thine only, this warm, dear
life. O loving Creator !
Thine the invisible future, born of
the present, must be.
SOFT, BROWN, SMILING EYES.
Soft, brown, smiling eyes.
Looking back through years,
Smiling through the mist of time.
Filling mine with tears;
On this sunny morn,
While the grape-blooms swing
In the scented air of June, —
Why these memories bring ?
Silky rippling curls.
Tresses long ago
Laid beneath the shaded sod
Where the violets blow;
Why across the blue
Of the peerless day
Do ye droop to meet my own.
Now all turned to gray ?
Voice whose tender tones
Break in sudden mirth.
Heard far back in boyhood's spring,
Silent now on earth ;
Why so sweet and clear.
While the bird and bee
Fill the balmy summer air,
Come your tones to me ?
Sweet, ah, sweeter far
Than yon thrush's trill.
Sadder, sweeter than the wind,
Woods, or murmuring rill.
Spirit words and songs
O' er my senses creep.
Do I breathe the air of dreams ?
Do I wake or sleep '?
WHY?
Why was I born, and wliere was I
Before this living mystery
That weds the body to the soul ?
What are the laws by whose control
CRANCH.
17'
I live and feel and think and know ?
What the allegiance that I owe
To tides beyond all time and space ?
AVhat form of faith must I embrace ?
Why thwarted, starved, and over-
borne
By fate. — an exile, driven forlorn
By titful winds, where each event
Seems but the whirl of accident'?
Why feel our wings so incomplete,
Or, flying, but a plumed deceit,
Renewing all our lives to us
The fable old of Icarus ?
Tell me the meaning of the breath
That whispers from the house of
death.
That chills thought's metaphysic
strife.
That dims the dream of After-life.
Why, if we lived not ere our birth,
Hope for a state beyond this earth ?
Tell me the secret of the hope
That gathers, as \\e upwards ope
The skylights of the prisoned soul
Unto the perfect and the whole;
Yet why the loveliest things of earth
Mock in their death their glorious
birth.
Why, when the scarlet sunset floods
The west beyond the hills and woods.
Or June with roses crowds my porch.
Or northern lights with crimson
torch
Illume the snow and veil the stars
With streaming bands and wavering
bars.
Or music's sensuous, soul-like wine
Intoxicates with trance divine. —
Why then must sadness like a thief
Steal my aromas of belief,
And like a cloud that shuts the day
At sunrise, turn my gold to gray ?
Tell me why instincts meant for good
Turn to a madness of the blood ;
And, baffling all our morals nice,
Nature seems nearly one with vice;
What sin and misery mean, if blent
With good in one ilivine intent.
Why from such source must evil
spring.
And finite still mean suffering '/
Look on the millions born to blight;
The souls that pine for warmth and
light:
The crushed and stifled swarms that
pack
The fold streets and the alleys black,
The miserable lives that cra\\l
Outside the grim partition wall
'Twixt rich and poor, 'twixt foul and
fair,
'Twixt vaulting hope and lame de-
spair.
On that wall's sunny side, within,
Hang ripening fruits and tendrils
green.
O'er garden-beds of bloom and spice.
And perfume as of paradise.
There happy children run and talk
Along the shade-flecked gravel-walk.
And lovers sit in rosy bowers.
And music overflows the hours,
x\.nd wealth and health and mirth
and books
Make pictures in Arcadian nooks.
But on that wall's grim outer stones
The fierce north-wind of winter
groans ;
Through blinding dust, o'er bleak
highway,
The slant sun's melancholy ray
Sees stagnant pool and poisonous
weed.
The hearts that faint, the feet that
bleed.
The grovelling aim, the flagging
faith.
The starving curse, the drowning
death !
O wise philosopher! you soothe
Our troubles with a touch too
smooth.
Too plausibly your reasonings come.
They will not guide me to my home;
They lead me on a little way
Through meadows, groves, and gar-
dens gay.
Until a wall shuts out my day, —
A screen whose top is hid in clouds.
Whose base is deep on dead men's
shrouds.
Could I dive under pain and death.
Or mount and breathe the who!?
heaven's breath.
178
CROLY.
I might begin to comprehend
How the Beginning joins the End.
We agonize in doubt, perplexed
O'er fate, free-will, and Bible-text.
In vain. The spirit finds no vent
From out the imprisoning tempera-
ment.
Therefore I bow my spirit to the
Power
That underflows and fills my little
hour.
I feel the eternal symphony afloat,
In Mhich I am a breath, a passing
note.
I may be but a dull and jarring nerve
In the great body, yet some end I
serve.
Yea, though I dream and question
still the dream
Thus floating by me upon Being's
stream,
Some end I serve. Love reigns. I
cannot lose
The Primal Light, though thousand-
fold its hues.
I can believe that somewhere Truth
abides;
Not in the ebb and flow of those
small tides
That float the dogmas of our saints
and sects ;
Not in a thousand tainted dialects.
But in the one pure language, could
we hear.
That fills with love and light the ser-
aphs' sphere.
I can believe there is a Central Good,
That burns and shines o'er tempera-
ment and mood ;
That somewhere God will melt the
clouds away.
And his great purpose shine as
shines the day.
Then may we know M'hy now we
could not know;
Why the great Isis-curtain drooped
so low;
Why we were blindfold on a path of
light;
Why came wild gleams and voices
through the night;
Why we seemed drifting, storm-tost,
without rest.
And were but rocking on a mother's
breast.
George Croly.
EVENING.
When eve is purpling cliff and cave.
Thoughts of the heart, liow soft ye
flow !
Not softer on the western wave
The golden lines of smiset glow.
Then all, by chance or fate removed,
Like spirits crowd upon the eye;
The few we liked — the one we loved !
And the whole heart is memory.
And life is like a fading flower,
Its beauty dying as we gaze;
Yet as the shadows round us lour.
Heaven pours above a brighter
blaze.
When morning sheds its gorgeous
Our hope, our heart, to earth is
given;
But dark and lonely is tlie eye
That tiu'ns not. at its eve, to lieaven.
CUPID GROWN CAREFUL.
There Avas once a gentle time
When the world was in its prime;
And every day was holiday,
And every month was lovely May.
Cupid then had but to go
With his purple wings and bow:
CROWNE — CUNNINGHAM.
179
And in blossomed vale and grove
Every shepherd knelt to love.
Then a rosy, dimpled cheek,
And a blue eye, fond and meek;
And a ringlet-wreathen brow,
Like hyacinths on a bed of snow :
And a low voice, silver sweet,
From a lip without deceit:
Only these the hearts could move
Of the simple swains to love.
But that time is gone and past,
Can the summer always last ?
And the swains are wiser grown,
And the heart is tiu-ned to stone,
And the maiden's rose may wither;
Cupid's fled, no man knows whither.
But another Cupid's come.
With a brow of care and gloom:
Fixed upon the earthly mould,
Thinking of the sullen gold;
In his hand the bow no more.
At his back the household store.
That the bridal gold nuist buy:
Useless now the smile and sigh;
But he wears the pinion still.
Flying at the sight of ill.
Oh, for the old true-love time,
When the world was in its prime!
John Crowne.
WISHES FOR ODSCUniTY.
How miserable a thing is a great
man!
Take noisy vexing greatness they
that please; (ease.
Give me obscure and safe and silent
Acquaintance and commerce let me
have none
With any powerful thing but time
alone :
My rest let Time be fearful to offend,
And creep by me as by a slumbering
friend ;
Oh, wretched he who, called abroad
by power.
To know himself can never find an
hour!
Strange to himself, but to all others
knoMU,
Lends every one his life, but uses
none ;
So, ere he tasted life, to death he
goes,
And himself loses ere himself he
knows.
Allan Cunningham.
THOU HAST SWORN BY THY GOD.
Tiiou hast sworn by thy God, my
Jeanie,
By that pretty white hand o' thine,
Anil by a' the lowing stars in heaven,
That thou wad aye be mine;
And I liae sworn by my God, my
Jeanie,
And by that kind heart o' thine.
By a' the stars sown thick owre
heaven.
That thou shalt aye be mine.
Then foul fa' the hands that wad
loose sic bands,
An' the heart that wad part sic
luve ;
But there's nae hand can loose my
band.
But the finger o' God abuve.
Though the wee, wee cot maun be
my bield.
And my claithing e'er so mean,
I wad lap me up rich i' the faulds o'
luve.
Heaven's armfu' o' my Jean.
180
CUNNINOEAM.
Her white arm wad be a pillow for me
Far saf ter than the down ;
And lave wad winnow owre us his
kind, kind wings,
An' sweetly I'd sleep, an' soun'.
Come here to me, thou lass o' my
luve,
Come here, and kneel wi' me !
The morn is fu' o' the presence o'
God.
An' I canna pray without thee.
The morn-wind is sweet 'mang tlie
beds o' new flowers,
The wee birds sing kindlie an" hie;
Our gudeman leans owre his kale-
yard dyke.
And a blitlie auld bodie is he.
The beuk maun l)e taen when the
carle conies liame.
Wi' the holie psalniodie;
And thou maun speak o" me to thy
God.
And I will speak o' thee.
SHE'S GANE TO DWELL IN
HE A VEX.
She's gane to dwall in heaven, my
lassie.
She's gane to dwall in heaven:
Ye" re owre pure, quo" the voice o' God,
For dwalling out o" heaven !
O, what'll she do in heaven, my las-
sie ?
O, what'll she do in heaven ?
She'll mix her ain thoughts wi' an-
gels' sangs,
An' make them mair meet for
heaven.
She was beloved by a', my lassie,
She was beloved by a' ;
But an angel fell in love \\ i" her.
An' took her frae us a'.
Low there thou lies, my lassie,
Low there thou lies,
A bonnier form ne'er went to the
yird,
Nor fra it will arise!
Fu' soon I'll follow thee, my lassie,
Fu' soon I'll follow thee;
Thou left me naught to covet ahin'
But took gudeness sel' wi' thee.
I looked on thy death-cold face, my
lassie,
I looked on thy death-cold face;
Thou seemed a lily new cut 1" the bud,
An' fading in its place.
I looked on thy death-shut eye, my
lassie,
I looked on thy death-shut eye ;
An' a lovelier liglit in the brow o'
heaven
Fell time shall ne'er destroy.
Thy lips were ruddy and calm, my
lassie.
Thy lips were ruddy and calm ;
But gane was the holy breath o' heav-
" en.
To sing the evening psalm.
There's naught but dust now mine,
lassie,
There's naught but dust now mine;
My Saul's wi' thee i' the cauld grave,
An' why should I stay behin' ?
A WET SHEET AND A FLOWING
SEA.
A "WET sheet and a flowing sea,
A wind that follows fast.
And fills the white and rustling sail.
And bends the gallant mast —
And bends the gallant mast, my boys,
While, like the eagle free.
Away the good ship flies, and leaves
Old England on our lee.
" O for a soft and gentle wind ! "
I heard a fair one cry :
But give to me the swelling breeze.
And white waves heaving higli, —
The white waves heaving higli, my
lads.
The good ship tight and free ;
The world of waters is our home,
And meriy men are we.
CURTIS — DANA.
181
George William Curtis.
MAJOR AND MlNOIi.
A BiiJD sang sweet and strong
In the top of the highest tree ;
He sang, — "1 pour out my soul in
song
For the summer that soon shall be. ' '
But deep in the shady wood
Another bird sang, — "I pour
iMy soul on the solemn solitude
For the springs that return no
more."
EGYPTIAN SERENADE.
Sixfi again the.song you sung,
"When we were together young —
When there were but you and I
Underneath the summer sky.
Sing the song, and o'er and o'er.
Though 1 know that nevermore
AVill it seem the song you sung
When we were together young.
MUSIC IN THE AIR.
Oh, listen to the howling sea,
That beats on the remorseless shore ;
Oh, listen, for that sound shall be.
When our wild hearts shall beat no
more.
Oh, listen well, and listen long!
For, sitting folded close to me.
You could not hear a sweeter song
Than that hoarse murmur of the
sea.
Richard Henry Dana.
THE HUSBAND AND WIFE'S
GRA VE.
Husband and wife ! no converse now
ye hold.
As once ye did in your young days of
love.
On its alarms, its anxious hours, de-
lays,
Its silent meditations and glad hopes,
Its fears, impatience, quiet sympa-
thies;
Xor do ye speak of joy assured, and
bliss
Full, certain, and possessed. Domes-
tic cares
Call you not now together. Earnest
talk
On what your children may be, moves
you not.
Ye lie in silence, and an awful silence;
Not like to that in which ye rested
once
Most happy, — silence eloquent, when
heart
With heart held speech, and your
mysterious frames.
Harmonious, sensitive, at every beat,
Touched the soft notes of love.
A stillness deep.
Insensible, imheeding, folds you
round.
And darkness, as a stone, has sealed
you in ;
Away from all the living, liere ye rest.
In ah tlie nearness of the narrow
tomb.
Yet feel ye not each other's presence
now ; —
Dread fellowship ! — together, yet
alone.
Why is it that I linger round this
tomb?
What liolds it? Dust that cumbered
those I mourn.
They shook it off, and laid aside
earth's robes.
182
DANA.
And put on those of light. They' re
gone to dwell
In love, — their (Jod's and angels' !
Mutual love,
That bound them here, no longer
needs a speecli
For full communion; nor sensations,
strong,
Within the breast, their prison, strive
in vain
To be set free, and meet their kind
in joy.
Changed to celestials, thoughts that
rise in each
Cy natures new, impart themselves,
though silent.
Each quickening sense, each throb
of holy love.
Affections sanctified, and the full
glow [one.
Of being, which expand and gladden
By union all mysterious, thrill and
live
In both immortal frames; — sensa-
tion all.
And thought, pervading, mingling
sense and thought I
Ye paired, yet one! wrapt in a con-
sciousness
Twofold, yet single, — this is love,
this life!
THE SOUL.
Come, brother, turn with me from
pining thought
And all the inward ills that sin has
wrought;
Come, send abroad a love for all who
live.
And feel the deep content in turn
they give.
Kind wishes and good deeds, — they
make not poor;
They '11 home again, full laden, to thy
door;
The streams of love flow back where
they begin.
For springs of outward joys lie deep
within.
Even let them flow, and make the
places glad
Where dwell thy fellow -men. —
Shouldst thou be sad,
And earth seem bare, and hours, once
hajjpy, press
Upon thy thoughts, and make thy
loneliness
More lonely for the past, thou then
shall hear
The music of those waters running
near ;
And thy faint spirit drink the cooling
stream,
And thine eye gladden with the play-
ing beam
That now upon the water dances, now
Leaps up and dances in the hanging
bough.
Is it not lovely? Tell me, where
doth dwell
The power that wrought so beautiful
a spell?
In thine own bosom, brother ? Then
as thine
Guard with a reverent fear this power
divine.
And if, indeed, 'tis not the out-
ward state.
But temper of the soul by which we
rate
Sadness or joy, even let thy bosom
move
With noble thoughts and ^\ake thee
into love;
And let each feeling in thy breast be
given
An honest aim, which, sanctified by
Heaven,
And springing into act, new life im-
parts,
Till beats thy frame as with a thou-
sand hearts.
Sin clouds the mind's clear vision
from its birth.
Around the self-starved soul has
spread a dearth.
The earth is full of life; the living
Hand
Touched it with life ; and all its forms
expand
With principles of being made to suit
Man's varied powers and raise him
from the brute.
And shall the earth of higher ends be
full, —
DEM ARE ST.
183
Earth which thou tread' st, — and thy
poor mind be dull ?
Thou talk of life, with half thy soul
asleep ?
Thou "living dead man," let thy
sjiirit leap
Forth to the day, and let the fresh
air blow
Through thy soul's shut-up mansion.
U'ouidst thou know
Something of what is life, shake off
this death; [breath
Have thy soul feel the universal
With which all nature's quick, and
learn to be [see;
Sharer in all that thou dost touch or
Break from thy body's grasp, thy
spirit's trance;
Give thy soul air, thy faculties ex-
panse ;
Love, joy, even sorrow, — yield tliy-
seif to all!
They make thy freedom, groveller,
not thy thrall.
Knock off the shackles which thy
spirit bind
To dust and sense, and set at large
the mind !
Then move in sympathy with God's
great whole,
And be like man at first, a living
soul.
Mary Lee Demarest.
MY AIN COUNTREE.
I'm far frae my hame, an' I'm weary
aftenwhiles,
For the langed-f or hanie-bringing, an'
my Father's welcome smiles;
I'll ne'er be fu' content, until mine
een do see
The shining gates o' heaven, an' mine
ain countree.
The earth is flecked wi' flowers, mony-
tinted, fresh, an' gay,
The birdies warble blithely, for my
Father made them sae ;
But these sights and these soun's will
as naething be to me.
When I hear the angels singing in my
ain countree.
I've his gude word of promise that
some gladsome day, the King
To his ain royal palace his banished
hame will bring :
Wi' een an ^\•i' hearts runnin' owre,
we shall see
The King in his beauty in our ain
countree.
My sins hae been mony, an' my sor-
rows hae been sair,
But there they'll never vex me, nor
be remembered mair;
His bluid has made me white, his
hand shall dry mine e'e,
When he brings me hame at last, to
my ain countree.
Like a bairn to its mither, a wee
birdie to its nest,
I wad fain be ganging noo, unto my
Saviour's breast:
For he gathers in his bosom, witless,
worthless lambs like me.
An' carries them liimsel' to his ain
countree.
He's faithfu' that hath promised,
he'll surely come again,
He'll keep his tryst wi' me, at what
hour I dinna ken ;
But he bids me still to wait, and ready
aye to be
To gang at any moment to my ain
countree.
So I'm watching aye an' singin' o' my
hame as I wait.
For the soun'ing o' his footfa' this
side the shining gate;
God gie his grace to ilk ane wha lis-
tens noo to me.
That we a' may gang in gladness to
our ain countree.
184
DE VERE.
Sir Aubrey De Vere.
MISSPENT TIME.
There is no remedy for time mis-
spent ;
No healing for the waste of idleness,
Whose very languor is a punish-
ment
Heavier than active souls can feel or
guess.
O hours of indolence and discontent,
Not now to be redeemed ! ye sting not
less
Because I know this span of life was
lent
For lofty duties, not for selfishness, —
Not to be whiled away in aimless
dreams.
But to improve ourselves, and serve
mankind,
Life and its choicest faculties were
given.
Man should be ever better than he
seems.
And shape his acts, anil discipline
his mind.
To walk adorning earth, with hope
of heaven.
COLUMBUS.
He was a man whom danger could
not daunt, |due;
Nor sophistry perplex, nor pain sub-
A stoic, reckless of the world's vain
taunt,
And steeled the path of honor to pur-
sue;
So, when by all deserted, still he
knew
How best, to soothe the heart-sick,
or confront
Sedition, schooled with equal eye to
view
The frowns of grief, and the base
pangs of want.
But when he saw that promised land
arise
In all its rare and bright varieties.
Lovelier than fondest fancy ever trod ;
Then softening nature melted in his
eyes;
He knew his fame was full, and
blessed his God;
And fell upon his face, and kissed
the virgin sod !
Aubrey Thomas De Vere.
[From The Poetic Faculti/.]
POWER OF POESY.
My grief or mirth
Attunes the earth,
I harmonize the world !
Eemotest times
And unfriendly climes
In my song lie clasped and curled!
When an arm too strong
Does the poor man wrong
I shout, and he liursts his chain:
But at my command
He drops the brand ;
And I sing as he Hings the grain.
The loved draw near,
The lost appear;
I sweeten the mourner's sigh:
At my vesper lay
The gafces of day
Close back with harmony.
No plains I reap,
I fold no sheep
Yet my home is on every shore:
My fancies I wing
AVith the plumes of spring.
And voyage the round earth o'er.
In the fight I wield
Nor sword nor shield,
But my voice like a lance makes way:
No crown I bear,
But the heads that wear
Earth's crowns, my word obey.
Through an age's night
I fling' the light
DE VERS.
185
Of my brow — An Argo soon
From her pine-wood leaps
On the unt racked deeps ;
And tlie dark becomes as noon.
THE ANGELS KISS HER.
The angels kiss her while she sleeps,
And leave their freshness on her
breath :
Star after star, descending, peeps
Along her loose hair, dark as death,
From his low nest the night-wind
creeps,
And o'er her bosom wandereth.
'Tis morning: in their pure embrace
The airs of dawn their playmate
greet :
Dusk fields expect their wonted grace.
Those silken touches of swift feet:
With songs the birds salute her face;
And Sifence doth her voice entreat!
BE y DING BETWEEN ME AND THE
TAPER.
Bending between me and the taper
While o'er the harp her white hands
strayed,
The shadows of her waving tresses
Above my hand were gently swayed .
With every graceful movement wav-
ing.
I marked their undulating swell :
I watched them while they met and
parted .
Curled close or widened, rose or fell.
I laughed in trimtiph and in pleasure.
So'strange the sport, so undesigned !
Her mother turned, and asked me
gravely,
" What thought was passing through
my mind?"
'Tis Love that blinds the eyes of
mothers !
'Tis I.ove that makes the young
maids fair!
She touched my hand ; my rings she
counted —
Yet never felt the shadows there !
Keep, gamesome Love, beloved in-
fant !
Keep ever thus all mothers blind:
And make thy dedicated virgins
In substance as in shadow kind !
HAPPY ARE THEY.
Happy are they who kiss thee, morn
and even,
Parting the hair upon thy forehead
white:
For them the sky is bluer and more
bright.
And purer their thanksgivings rise to
Heaven.
Happy are they to whom thy songs
are given;
Happy are they on whom thy hands
alight:
And happiest they for whom thy
prayers at night
In tender piety so oft have striven.
Away with vain regrets and selfish
sighs —
Even l,"dear friend, am lonely, not
un blest;
Permitted sometimes on that form to
gaze.
Or feel the light of those consoling
eyes —
If but a moment on my cheek it
stays
I know that gentle beam from all the
rest!
AFFLICTION.
CouxT each aflliction, whether light
or grave,
God's messenger sent down to thee.
Do thou
With courtesy receive him: rise and
bow:
And, ere his shadow pass thy thresh-
old, crave
186
DE VERB.
Permission first his heavenly feet to
lave.
Tlien lay before hiiu all thou hast.
Allow
No cloud of passion to usurp thy
brow,
Or mar thy hospitality; no wave
Of mortal tumult to obliterate
The soul's marmoreal calmness. Grief
should be
Like joy, majestic, equable, sedate;
Confirming, cleansing, raising, mak-
ing free ;
Strong to consume small troubles; to
connnend
Great thoughts, grave thoughts,
thoughts lasting to the end.
BEATITUDE.
Blessed is he who hath not trod the
ways
Of secular delights; nor learned the
lore
Which loftier minds are studious to
abhor.
Blessed is he who hath not sought the
praise
That perishes, tlie rapture that be-
trays :
Who hath not spent in Time's vain-
glorious war
Ilis youth: and found, a school-boy
at fourscore.
How fatal are tliose victories which
raise
Their iron trophies to a temple's
height
On trampled Justice: who desires not
bliss.
But peace ; and yet when summoned
to the fight,
Combats as one who combats in the
sight
Of God and of His angels, seeking
this
Alone, how best to glorify the Eight.
THE AlOOD OF EXALTATIOy.
What man can hear sweet sounds
and dread to die ?
O for a nuisic that might last forever !
Abounding from its sources like a
river
Whicli tln-ough the dim lawns streams
eternally !'
Virtue nnght then uplift her crest on
high.
ISpurning those myriad bonds that
fret and grieve her:
Then all the powers of hell would
quake and quiver
Before the ardors of her awful eye.
Alas for man with all his high de-
sires.
And inward promptings fading day
by day !
High-titled honor pants while it ex-
pires.
And clay-born gloiy turns again to
clay.
Low instincts last: our great resolves
pass by
Like winds whose loftiest ptean ends
but in a sigh.
ALL THINGS SWEET WHEN
I'UIZED.
Sad is our youth, for it is ever going,
Crumbling away beneath our very
feet:
Sad is our life, for onward it is flow-
ing
In current unperceived, because so
fleet:
Sad are our hopes, for they were sweet
in sowing.
But tares, self-sown, have overtopped
the wheat:
Sad are our joys, for they were sweet
in blowing —
And still, oh still, their dying breath
is sM'eet.
And sweet is youth, although it hath
bereft us
Of that whicli made our childhood
sweeter still :
And sweet is middle life, for it hath
left us
A nearer good to cure an older ill:
And sweet are all things, when we
learn to prize them
Not for their sake, but His who grants
them or denies them !
DICKENS — DICKINSON.
187
Charles Dickens.
THE IVY GREEN.
Oh! a dainty plant is the Ivy green,
That creepeth o'er ruins old;
Of right choice food are his meals, 1
ween,
In his cell so lone and cold.
The walls must be crumbled, the
stones decayed,
To pleasure his dainty whim ;
And the mouldering dust that years
have made
Is a merry meal for him.
Creeping where no life is seen,
A rare old plant is the Ivy green.
Fast he stealeth on, though he wears
no wings.
And a staunch old heart has he!
How closely he twineth, how tight he
clings
To his friend, the huge oak tree!
And slyly he traileth along the
ground,
And his leaves he gently waves,
And he joyously twines and hugs
around
The rich mould of dead men's
graves.
Creeping where no life is seen,
A rare old plant is the Ivy green.
Whole ages have fled, and their works
decayed.
And nations scattered been ;
But the stout old Ivy shall never fade
From its hale and hearty green.
The brave old plant in its lonely days
.Shall fatten upon the past;
For the stateliest building man can
raise
Is the Ivy's food at last.
Creeping where no life is seen,
A rare old plant is the Ivy green.
Charles M. Dickinson.
THE CHILDnEN.
When the lessons and tasks are all
ended.
And the school for the day is dis-
missed.
The little ones gather around me,
To bid me good-night and be kissed ;
Oh, the little white arms that encir-
cle
My neck in their tender embrace!
Oh, the smiles that are halos of heav-
en.
Shedding sunshine of love on my
face!
And when they are gone I sit dream-
ing
Of my childhood too lovely to last ;
Of joy that my heart will remember.
While it wakes to the pulse of the
past,
Ere the world and its wickedness
made me
A partner of sorrow and sin.
When the glory of God was about me.
And the glory of gladness within.
All my heart grows as weak as a
woman's.
And the fountains of feeling will
flow,
•When I think of the patlis steep and
stony.
Where the feet of the dear ones
must go ;
Of the mountains of sin hanging o'er
them.
Of the tempest of Fate blowing
wild ;
Oh ! there's nothing on earth half so
holy
As the innocent heart of a child!
They are idols of hearts and of house-
holds,
They are angels of God in disguise;
His sunlight still sleeps in their tres-
ses, '
His glory still gleams in their eyes ;
Those truants from home and from
heaven —
They have made me more manly
and mild ;
And I know now how Jesus could
liken
The kingdom of God to a child I
I ask not a life for the dear ones,
All radiant, as others have done,
But that life may have just enough
shadow
To temper the glare of the sun
I would pray God to guard them
from evil,
But my prayer -would bound back
to myself ;
Ah ! a seraph may pray for a sinner.
But a sinner must pray for himself.
The twig is so easily bended,
I have banished the rule and the
rod ;
I have taught them the goodness of
knowledge.
They have taught me the goodness
of God :
My heart is the dungeon of darkness.
Where I shut them for breaking a
rule :
My frown is sutficient correction;
My love is the law of the school.
I shall leave the old house in the au-
tumn.
To traverse its threshold no more ;
Ah! how 1 shall sigh for the dear
ones.
That meet me each morn at the
door!
I shall miss the "good-nights" and
kisses, [glee.
And the gush of their innocent
The group on the green, and the
flowers
That are brought eveiy morning
for me.
I shall miss them at morn and at even.
Their song in the school and the
street ;
I shall miss the low hum of their
voices.
And the tread of their delicate feet.
When the lessons of life are all ended,
And death says " The school is dis-
missed!"
May the little ones gather around me
To bid me "good-night" and be
kissed !
Mary Lowe Dickinson.
IF WE HAD BUT A DAY.
We should fill the hours with the^
sweetest things,
If we had but a day ;
We should drink alone at the piu'est
s])rings
In our upward way ;
We should love with a lifetime's love
in an hour.
If the hours were few ;
We should rest, not for dreams, but
for fresher power
To be and to do.
We should guide our wayward or
wearied wills
By the clearest light;
We shoidd keep our eyes on the
heavenly hills,
If they lay in sight;
We should trample the pride and the
discontent
Beneath our feet ;
We should take whatever a good
God sent,
With a trust complete.
We should waste no moments in
weak regret,
If the day were but one ;
If what we remember and M'hat we
forget
Went out with tlie sim ;
We should be from our clamorous
selves set free,
To work or to pray,
And to be what the Father would
have us be.
If we had but a day.
Sydney Thompson Dobell,
AMERICA.
Nor force nor fraud shall sunder us !
Oye
Wlio north or soutli, on east or west-
ern lands,
Native to noble sounds, say truth for
truth.
Freedom for freedom, love for love,
and God
For God. O ye, who in eternal
youth
Speak with a living and creative flood
This universal Englisli, and do stand
Its breatliing book; live worthy of
that grand
Heroic utterance, — parted, yet a
whole,
Far, yet unsevered, — cliildren brave
and free
Of tlie great mother-tongue, and ye
shall be
Lords of an empire wide as Sliakes-
peare's soul.
Sublime as Milton's immemorial
theme.
And rich as Chaucer's speech, and
fair as Spenser's dream.
HOME, WOUNDED.
Stay wherever you will.
By the mount or imder the hill.
Or down by the little river:
Stay as long as you please.
Give me only a bud from the trees.
Or a blade of grass in morning dew.
Or a cloudy violet clearing to blue,
I could look on it forever.
Wheel, wheel through the sunshine,
Wlieel, wheel through the shadow;
There must be odors round the pine.
There must be balm of breathing
kine.
Somewhere down in the meadow.
Must I choose? Then anchor me
there
Beyond the beckoning poplars, where
The larch is snooding her floweiy
hair
With wreaths of morning shadow.
Among the thickest hazels of tlie
brake
Perchance some nightingale doth
shake [song;
His featliers, and the air is fidl of
In those old days when I was young
and strong.
He used to sing on yonder garden tree,
Beside the nursery.
Along my life my length I lay,
I fill to-morrow and yesterday,
I am warm with the suns that have
long since set,
I am warm with the sunnners that are
not yet.
And like one who dreams and dozes
Softly afloat on a sunny sea.
Two worlds are whispering over me.
And tliere blows a wind of roses
From the backward sliore to the shore
before,
From the shore before to the back-
ward shore.
And like two clouds that meet and pour
Each through each, till core in core
A single self reposes,
The nevermore with the evermore
Above me mingles and closes.
190
DOB SON.
Austin Dobson.
THE CHILD MUSICIAX.
He had played for liis lordship's
levee,
He had played for her ladyship's
whim,
Till the poor little head was heavy,
And the poor little brain would
swim.
And the face grew peaked and eerie,
And the large eyes strange and
bright,
And they said, — too late, — "He is
weary !
He shall rest for at least to-night ! ''
But at dawn, when the birds were
waking,
As they watched in the silent
room.
With the sound of a strained cord
breaking,
A something snapped in the gloom.
'Twas a string of his violoncello.
And they heard him stir in his bed :
" Make room for a tired little fellow.
Kind God!" was the last that he
said.
THE PRODIGALS.
" Princes! — and you, most valorous
Nobles and barons of all degrees !
Hearken awhile to the prayer of us,
Prodigals driven of destinies !
Nothing we ask of gold or fees ;
Harry us not with the hounds, we
pray;
Lo! for the surcote's hem we seize,
Give us, ah ! give us, — but yester-
day!
"Dames most delicate, amorous!
Damosels blithe as the belted bees !
Beggars are we that pray thee thus.
Beggars outworn of miseries!
Nothing we ask of. the things that
please ;
Weaiy are we, and old, and gray :
Lo, — for we clutch and we clasp
your knees, —
Give us, ah! give us, — but yesterday!
" Damosels, dames, be piteous!"
(But the dames rode fast by the
roadway trees. )
" Hear us, O knights magnanimous I "
(But the knights pricked on in
their panoplies.)
Nothing they gat of hope or ease.
But only to beat on the breast, and
say,—
"Life we drank to the diegs and
lees;
Give us. all! give us, — but yester-
day!"
EXVOV.
Youth, take heed to the jirayer of
these !
Many there be by the dusty way, —
Many that cry to the rocks and seas,
"Give us, ah! give us, — but yes-
terday ! ' '
"FAREWELL, RENOWN!"
Farewell, Renown! Too fleeting
flower,
That grows a year to last an hour ; —
Prize of the race's dust and heat.
Too often trodden luider feet, —
Why should 1 court your "barren
dower"?
Nay; had I Dryden's angry power. —
The thews of Ben, — the wind of
Gower, —
Not less my voice should still repeat
' ' Farewell, Renown ! ' '
FarcM'ell !— Because the Muses' bower
Is filled with rival brows that lower; —
Because, howe'er his pipe be sweet,
The Bard, that " pays," must please
the street; —
But most . . . because the grapes are
sour, —
Farewell, Renown !
DODGE.
191
Mary Mapes Dodge.
THE HUMAN TIE.
"As if life were not sacred, too."
George Eliot.
" Speak tenderly! For he is dead,"
we say ;
"With gracious hand smootli all
liis rougliened past,
And fullest measure of reward
forecast,
Forgetting naught that gloried his
brief day."
Yet of the brother, who, along our
way,
Prone with his burdens, heart-
worn in the strife,
Totters before us — how we search
his life.
Censure, and sternly punish, while
we may.
Oh, weary are the paths of Earth,
and hard !
And living hearts alone are ours to
guard.
At least, begrudge not to the sore dis-
traught
The reverent silence of our pitying
thought.
Life, too, is sacred; and he best for-
gives
Who says : " He errs, but — tenderly !
He lives."
MY WIXDOW-IVY.
OvEU my window the ivy climbs.
Its roots are in homely jars:
But all the day it looks at the sun.
And at night looks out at the stars.
Tlie dust of the room may dim its
green.
But I call to the breezy air:
" Come in, come in, good friend of
mine !
And make my window fair."
So the ivy thrives from morn to morn.
Its leaves all turned to the light;
And it gladdens my soul ■with its
tender green.
And teaches me day and night.
What though my lot is in lowly place,
And my spirit behind the bars;
All tlie long day I may look at the
sun,
And at night look out at the stars.
What though the dust of earth would
dim?
There's a glorious outer air
Tliat will sweei3 through my soul if I
let it in,
And make it fresh and fair.
Dear God ! let me grow from day to
day.
Clinging and sunny and bright!
Though planted in shade. Thy m in-
dow is near.
And my leaves may turn to the
light.
DEATH IX LIFE.
She sitteth there a moiu'uer.
With her dead before her eyes ;
Flushed with the hues of life is he
And quiciv are his replies.
Often his warm hand touches hers;
Brightly liis glances fall;
And yet, in this wide world, is she
The loneliest of all.
Some mom-ners feel their dead return
In dreams, or thoughts at even ;
Ah, well for them their best-beloved
Are faithful still in heaven!
But woe to her whose best beloved.
Though dead, still lingers near;
So far away when by her side,
He cannot see nor hear.
Witli heart intent, he comes, he goes
In busy ways of life.
His gains and chances counteth he;
His hours with joy are rife.
192
BODGE.
Careless he greets her day by clay,
Nor thinks of words once said, —
Oh, would that love could live again,
Or her heart give up its dead!
HEART-ORACLES.
By the motes do we know where the
sunbeam is slanting;
Through the hindering stones,
speaks the soul of the brook;
Past the rustle of leaves we press
into the stillness;
Through darkness and void to the
Pleiads we look;
One bird-note at dawn with the night-
silence o'er us.
Begins all the morning's munificent
chorus.
Through sorrow come glimpses of
infinite gladness;
Through grand discontent mounts
the spirit of youth;
Loneliness foldeth a wonderful lov-
ing;
The lireakers of Doubt lead the
great tide of Truth:
And dread and grief-haunted the
shadowy poital
That shuts from our vision the splen-
dor immortal.
THE CHILD AND THE SEA.
One summer day, when birds flew
high.
1 saw a child step into the sea;
It glowed and sparkled at her touch
And softly plashed about her
knee.
It held her lightly with its strength.
It kissed and kissed her silken hair ;
It swayed with tenderness to know
A little child was in its care.
She, gleeful, dipped her pretty arms.
And caught the sparkles in her
hands ;
I lieard her laughter, as she soon
Came skipping up the sunny sands.
" Is this the -cruel sea ? " I thought,
" The merciless, the awful sea ? " —
Now hear the answer soft and true.
That rippled over the beach to me :
•'Shall not the sea, in the sun, be
glad
When a child doth come to play ?
Had it been in the storm-time, wliat
could I,
The sea, but bear her away —
Bear lier away on my foaming crest.
Toss her and hurry her to her rest '.'
" Be it life or death, God ruleth me;
And he lovetli every soul :
I've an earthly shore and a heavenly
shore.
And toward them both I roll ;
Shining and beautiful, lioth are
they, —
And a little child will go God's
way. ' '
THE STARS.
They wait all day unseen by us, un-
felt;
Patient they bide behind the day's
full glare;
And we" who watched the dawn
when they were there.
Thought we had seen them in the
daylight melt.
While the slow sun upon the earth-
line knelt.
Because the teeming sky seemed
void and bare,
W^hen we explored it through the
dazzled air,
^Ve had no thought that there all
day they dwelt.
Yet were they over us, alive and true.
In the vast shades far up above the
blue, —
The brooding shades beyond our
daylight ken —
Serene and patient in their con-
scious light
Ready to sparkle for our joy again, —
The eternal jewels of the short-
lived night.
Julia C. R. Dorr.
WHAT SHE THOUGHT.
Mahion showed me her wedding
gown
And her veil of gossamer lace to-
night,
And the orange-blooms that to-mor-
row morn
Shall fade in her soft hair's golden
light.
But Philip came to the open door:
Like the heart of a wild-rose
glowed her cheek,
And they wandered off through the
garden paths
So blest that they did not care to
speak.
I wonder how it seems to be loved :
To know you are fair in some
one's eyes;
Tliat upon some one your beauty
dawns
Every day as a new surprise ;
To know, that, whether you weep or
smile.
Whether your mood be grave or
gay,
Somebody thinks you, all the while.
Sweeter than any flower of May.
I wonder what it would be to love:
That, I think, would be sweeter
far.
To know that one out of all the world
Was lord of your life, your king,
your star.
They talk of love's sweet tumult and
pain:
I am not sure that I understand.
Though, — a thrill ran down to my
fmger-tips
Once when, — somebody, — touched
my hand !
I wonder what it would be to dream
Of a child that might one day be
your own: [part.
Of the hidden springs of your life a
Flesh of your flesh, and bone of
your bone.
Marion stooped one day to kiss
A beggar's babe with a tender
grace ;
While some sweet thought, like a
prophecy,
Looked from her pure Madonna
face.
1 wonder what it must be to think
To-morrow will be your wedding-
day.
And you, in the radiant sunset glow
Down fragrant flowery paths will
stray.
As Marion does this blessed night.
With Philip, lost in a blissful
dream.
Can she feel his heart through the
silence beat?
Does he see her eyes in the star-
light gleam ?
Questioning thus, my days go on ;
But never an answer comes to me :
All love's mysteries, sweet as strange,
Sealed away from my life must be.
Yet still I dream, O lieart of mine!
Of a beautiful city that lies afar;
And there, some time, I shall drop
the mask.
And be shapely and fair as others
are.
AT THE LAST.
Wii-L the day ever come, I wonder.
When I shall be glad to know
That my hands will be folded under
The next white fall of the snow ?
To know that when next the clover
Wooeth the wandering bee,
Its crimson tide will driift over
All that is left of me ? '
Shall I ever be tired of living.
And be glad to go to mv rest,
With a cool and fragrant lily
Asleep on my silent breast ?
194
DORR.
Will my eyes grow weary of seeing,
As the hours pass, one by one.
Till I long for the hush and the dark-
ness
As I never longed for tlie sun ?
God knoweth ! Some time, it may be,
I shall smile to hear you say :
"Dear heart! she will not waken
At the dawn of another day ! "
And some time, love, it may be,
I shall whisper under my breath :
'' The happiest hour of my life, dear.
Is this, — the hour of my death ! ' '
WHAT NEED.'
" What need has the singer to sing?
And why should your poet to-day
His pale little garland of i^oesy bring.
On the altar to lay ?
High-priests of song the harp-strings
swept
Ages before he smiled or wept'! "
What need have the roses to bloom ?
And why do the tall lilies grow ?
And wliy do the violets shed their
l)erfume
When night-winds breathe low ?
They are no whit more bright and
fair ~ I air!
Than flowers that breathed in Eden's
What need have the stars to shine
on ?
Or the clouds to grow red in the
west,
When the sun, like a king, from the
fields he has won.
Goes grandly to rest ?
No brighter they than stars and skies
That greeted Eve's sweet, wonder-
mg eyes
What need has the eagle to soar
So proudly straight up to the sun '?
Or the robin such jubilant music to
pour
When day is begun ?
The eagles soared, the robins sung,
A3 high, as sweet, when earth was
young !
AVhat need, do you ask me ? Each
day
Hath a song and a prayer of its
own.
As each June hath its crown of fresh
roses, each May
Its bright emerald throne!
Its own high thought each age shall
stir.
Each needs its own interpreter !
And thou, O, my poet, sing on I
Sing on until love shall grow old;
Till patience and faith their last tri-
umphs have won.
And truth is a tale that is told!
Doubt not, thy song shall still be new
While life endures and God is true!
PERADVENTURE.
I AM thinking to-night of the little
child
That lay on my breast three sum-
mer days.
Then swiftly, silently, dropped from
sight,
W^hile my soul cried out in sore
amaze.
It is fifteen years ago to-niglit;
Somewliere, I know, he has lived
them through.
Perhaps with never a thought or
dream |knew!
Of the mother-heart he never
Is he yet but a babe ? or has he grown
To be like his brothers, fair and
tall.
With a clear bright eye, and a spring-
ing step.
And a voice that rings like a bugle
I loved him. The rose in his waxen
hand
Was wet with the dew of my fall-
ing tears;
I have kept the thought of my baby's
grave
Througli all the length of these
changeful years.
Yet the love I gave him was not like
that
I give to-day to my other boys,
Who have grown beside me, and
turned to me
In all their griefs and in all their
joys.
Do you think he knows it ? I won-
der nuicli
If the dead are passionless, cold
and dumb;
If into the calm of the deathless
years
No thrill of a human love may
come !
Perhaps sometimes from the upper
air
He has seen me walk with his
brothers three;
Or felt in the tender twilight hour
The breath of the kisses they gave
to me !
Over his birthright, lost so soon,
Perhaps he has sighed as the swift
years flew;
O child of my heart! you shall find
somewhere
The love that on earth you never
knew 1
THOU KNOW EST.
Thou knowest, O my Father! Why
should I
Weary high heaven with restless
prayers and tears !
Thou knowest all ! My heart's unut-
tered cry
Hath soared beyond the stars and
reached Thine ears.
Thou knowest.— ah. Thou knowest!
Then what need,
O, loving God, to tell Thee o'er
and o'er.
And with persistent iteration plead
As one who crieth at some closed
door '?
"Tease not!" we mothers to our
children say. —
" Oiu' wiser love w ill grant what e'er
is best."
,Shall we. Thy children, run to Thee
alway.
Begging for this and that in wild
I dare not clamor at the heavenly
gate.
Lest I should lose the high, sweet
strains within;
O, Love Divine! I can but stand and
wait
Till Perfect Wisdom bids me en-
ter in !
FIVE.
"BvT a week is so long! " he said,
AVith a toss of his curly head.
" One, two, three, four, five, six.
seven ! —
Seven Avliole days ! Why, in six you
know
(You said it yourself, — you told me
so)
The great God up in heaven
Made all the earth and the seas and
skies,
The trees and the birds and the but-
terflies !
IIow can I wait for mv seeds to
' ' But a month is so long ! " he
said.
With a droop of his boyish head.
"Hear me count, — one, two, three,
four, —
Four whole weeks, and three days
more ;
Thirty-one days, and each will creep
As the shadows crawl over yonder
steep.
Thirty-one nights, and I shall lie
Watching the stars climb up the sky.'
How cani Mait till a month is o'er?"
"But a year is so long!" he said.
Uplifting his bright young head.
"All the seasons must come and go
Over the hill with footsteps slow, —
Autumn and winter, summer and
spring;
Oh, for a bridge of gold to fling
Over the chasm deep and wide,
That I might cross to the other side.
Where she is waiting, — my love, my
bride!"
" Ten years may be long," he said,
Slow raising his stately head,
" But there's much to win, there is
much to lose;
A man must labor, a man nuist
choose.
And he must be strong to wait!
The years may be long, but who
would wear
The crown of honor, must do and
dare !
No time has he to toy with fate
Who would climb to manhood's high
estate!"
" Ah ! life is not long! " he said.
Bowing his grand white head.
" One, two, three, four, five, six,
seven!
Seven times ten are seventy.
Seventy years ! as swift their flight
As swallows cleaving the morning
light.
Or golden gleams at even.
Life is short as a simimer night, —
How long, O God ! is eternity ? "
AT DAWN.
At dawn when the jubilant morning
broke.
And its glory flooded the mountain
side,
I said, " 'Tis eleven years to-day,
Eleven years since my darling
died!"
And then I turned to my household
ways.
To my daily tasks, without, within,
As happily busy all the day
As if my darling had never been !
As if she had never lived, or died!
Yet when they buried her out of
my sight,
I thought the sun had gone down at
noon.
And the day could never again be
bright.
Ah, well ! As the swift years come
and go.
It will not be long ere I shall lie
Somewhere under a bit of turf.
With my pale hands folded quietly.
And then some one who has loved
me well, —
Perhaps the one wlio has loved me
best, —
Will say of me as I said of her,
"She has been just so many years
at rest," —
Then turn to the living loves again,
To the busy life, without, within.
And the day will go on from dawn to
dusk,
Even as if 1 had never been !
Dear hearts! dear hearts! It must
still be so!
The roses will bloom, and the stars
will shine.
And the soft green grass creep still
and slow.
Sometime over a grave of mine, —
And over the grave in your liearts as
well !
Ye cannot hinder it if ye would ;
And I, — ah! I shall be wiser then, —
I would not hinder it if I could!
Joseph Rodman Drake.
THE AMERICAN FLAG.
When Freedom from her mountain
heiglit
Unfurled her standard to the air,
She tore the azure robe of night,
And set the stars of glory there;
She mingled with its gorgeous dyes
The milky baldric of the skies,
And striped its pure, celestial wliite
With streakings of the morning
light;
Then from his mansion in the sun
She called her eagle-bearer doWn,
And gave into his mighty hand
The symbol of her chosen land.
Majestic monarch of the cloud !
Who rear'st aloft thy regal form.
To hear the tempest-trumi>ings loud.
And see the lightning lances driven,
When strive the warriors of the
storm,
And rolls the thunder-drum of
heaven ;
Child of the sun! to thee 'tis given
To guard the banner of the free.
To hover in the sulphur smoke.
To ward away the battle-stroke.
And bid its blendings shine afar.
Like rainbows on the cloud of war,
The harbingers of victory !
Flag of the brave! thy folds shall fly.
The sign of hope and triumph high,
When speaks the signal trumpet tone.
And the long line comes gleaming
on; "
Ere yet the life-blood, warm and wet,
Has dimmed the glistening bayonet.
Each soldier eye shall brightly turn
To where thy sky-born gtories burn,
And, as bis springing steps advance,
Catch war and vengeance from the
glance ;
And when the cannon-mouthings
loud
Heave in wild wreaths the battle-
shroud.
And gory sabres rise and fall,
Like shoots of flame on midnight's
pall;
Then shall thy meteor-glances glow,
And cowering foes shall sink be-
neath
Each gallant arm that strikes below
That lovely messenger of death.
Flag of the seas ! on ocean wave
Thy stars shall glitter o'er the brave;
When death, careering on the gale.
Sweeps darkly round the bellied
sail.
And frighted waves rush wildly back
Before the broad-side's reeling rack,
Each dying wanderer of the sea
Shall look at once to heaven and
thee.
And smile to see thy splendors fly
In triumph o'er his closing eye.
Flag of the free heart's hope and
home.
By angel hands to valor given ;
Thy stars have lit the welkin dome.
And all thy hues were born in
heaven.
For ever float that standard sheet !
Where breathes the foe but falls
before us,
AVith Freedom's soil beneath our
feet,
And Freedom's banner streaming
o'er us ?
198
DBA YTON — DR UMMOND.
Michael Drayton.
THE PARTIXG.
SiNX'E there's no help, coine, let us
kiss and part;
Nay, I have done, you get no more
of nie;
And I am glad, yea, glad with all my
heart
That thus so cleanly 1 myself can
free ;
Shake hands for ever, cancel all our
vows ;
And when we meet at any time
again.
Be it not seen in either of our brows
That we one jot of former love re-
tain. —
Now at the last gasp of Love's latest
breath.
When his pulse failing, Passion
speechless lies.
When Faith is kneeling by his bed of
death,
And Innocence is closing up his
eyes.
Now if thou wouldst, when all have
given him over,
From death to life thou mighfst him
yet recover.
William Drummond.
DESPITE ALL.
I KNOW that all beneath the moon
decays ;
And what tjy mortals in this world is
brought,
In time's great periods shall return
to nought ;
That fairest states have fatal nights
and days.
I know that all the Muses' heavenly
lays.
With toil of sprite which are so dear-
ly bought,
As idle sounds, of fev/ or none are
sought ;
That there is nothing lighter than
vain praise.
I know frail beauty's like the purple
floM'er
To which one morn oft birth and
death affords;
That love a jarring is of mind's
accords.
Where sense and will bring under
reason's power:
Know Avhat I list, this all cannot me
move, [love.
But that, alas ! I both nuist write and
WH4T WE TOIL FOR.
Of mortal glory O soon darkened
ray!
O wiim^d joys of man, more swift
than wind!
O fond desires, which in our fancies
stray !
O traitorous hopes, which do our
judgments blind!
Lo, in a flash that light is gone away
Which dazzle did each eye, delight
each mind.
And, with that sun from whence it
came combined,
Now makes more radiant Heaven's
eternal day.
Let Beauty now bedew her cheeks
with tears;
Let widowed Music only roar and
groan ;
Poor Virtue, get thee wings and
mount the spheres.
For dwelling-place on earth for thee
is none!
Death hath thy temple razed. Love's
empire foiled,
The world of honor, worth, and
sweetness spoiled.
DRYDEN.
199
John Dryden.
ALEXANDER'S FEAST; OR, THE POWER OF MUSIC.
AN ODE IX HONOR OF ST. CECILIA'S DAY.
'TwAS at the royal feast, for Persia won
By Philip's warlike son:
Aloft in awful state
The godlike hero sate
On his imperial throne:
His valiant peers were placed around,
Tlieir brows with roses and with myitles bound ;
(So should desert in arms be crowned.)
The lovely Thais by his side,,
Sate like a blooming Eastern bride
In flower of youth and beauty's pride.
Happy, happy, happy pair"!
None but the brave,
None but the brave,
None but the brave deserves the fair.
CHORrS.
Happy, happy, happy pair !
None but the brave.
None but the brave,
None but the brave deserves the fair.
Timotheus placed on high,
Amid the tuneful choir.
With flying fingers touched the lyre:
The trembling notes ascend the sky,
And heavenly joys inspire. •
The song began from .Jove,
Who left his blissful seats above,
(Such is the power of mighty love. )
A dragon's fiery form belied the god:
Sublime on radiant spires he rode.
When he to fair Olympia pressed:
And while he sought her snowy breast:
Then round her slender waist he curled.
And stamped an image of himself, a sovereign of the world.
The listening crowd admire the lofty soimd,
A present deity! thev shout around':
A present deity! the vaulted roofs rebound.
With ravislied ears
The monarch hears,
Assumes the god,
Affects to nod.
And seems to shake the spheres.
"m
CHORUS.
With ravished ears
The monarch liears,
Assumes the god,
Affects to nod,
And seems to shake tlie spheres.
The praise of Bacclius tlien the sweet musician sung.
Of Bacchus — ever fair and ever young:
The jolly god in triumph comes;
Sound thetrumpets ; beat the drums :
Flushed with a purple grace
He shows his honest face;
Now give the hautboys breath. He comes ! he comes !
Bacchus, ever fair and young.
Drinking joys did first ordain;
Bacchus' blessings' are a treasure.
Drinking is the soldier's pleasure:
Rich the treasure.
Sweet the pleasure.
Sweet is pleasure after pain.
CHORUS.
Bacchus' blessings are a treasure,
Drinking is the soldier's pleasure,
Kich the treasure,
Sweet the pleasure.
Sweet is pleasure after pain.
Soothed with the sound the king grew vain;
Fought all his battles o'er again;
And thrice he routed all his foes; and thrice he slew the slain.
The master saw the madness rise ;
His glowing cheeks, his ardent eyes;
And, while he^ieaven and earth defied.
Changed his hand, and checked his pride.
He chose a mournful muse
Soft pity to infuse:
He sung Darius, great and good ;
By too severe a fate,
Fallen, fallen, fallen, fallen,
Fallen from his high estate,
And weltering in his blood ;
Deserted, at his utmost need.
By those his foi'mer bounty fed ;
On the bare earth exposed he lies,
With not a friend to close his eyes.
With downcast looks the joyless victor sate,
Revolving in his altered soul
The various tiu'ns of chance below;
And, now and then a sigh he stole ;
And tears began to flow.
DRYJJEN.
201
CHORUS.
Revolving; in his altered soul
The vaiious turns of chance below ;
And, now an^J then, a sigh he stole;
And tears began to flow.
The mighty master smiled, to see
That love was in the next degree;
'Twas but a kindred-sound to move,
For pity melts the mind to love.
Softly sweet, in Lydian measures.
Soon he soothed his soul to pleasures.
War, he sung, is toil and trouble;
Honor but an empty l)ut)ble;
Never ending, still beginning,
Fighting still, and still destroying:
If the world be worth thy winning,
Think, oh, think it worth enjoying:
Lovely Thais sits beside thee.
Take the good the gods provide thee.
The many rend the skies with loud applause;
So Love was crowned, but Music won the cause.
The prince, unable to conceal his pain,
Gazed on the fair
Who caused his care.
And sighed and looked, sighed and looked,
Sighed and looked, and sighed again:
At length, with love and wine at once oppressed,
The vanquished victor sunk upon her breast.
CHORUS.
The prince, imabled to conceal his pain,
Gazed on the fair
Who caused his care.
And sighed and looked, sighed and looked.
Sighed and looked, and sighed again:
At length with love and wine at once oppressed,
The vanquished victor sunk upon her breast.
Now strike the golden lyre again :
A louder yet, and yet a louder strain.
Break his bands of sleeji asunder,
And rouse him like a rattling peal of thunder.
Hark, hark, the horrid sound
Has raised up his head:
As awaked from the dead.
And amazed, lie siares around.
Revenge! revenge! Timotheus cries,
See the furies arise !
See the snakes that they rear,
How they hiss in their hair!
And the spai-kles that flash from their eyes !
202
DRY DEN.
Behold a ghastly band,
Each a torch in his hand !
Those are Grecian ghosts, that in battle were slain,
And unburied remain,
Inglorious on the plain: *
Give the vengeance due
To the valiant crew.
Behold how they toss their torches on high,
How they point to the Persian abodes.
And glittering temples of their hostile gods.
The princes applaud with a furious joy :
And the king seized a flambeau with zeal to destroy;
Thais led the way.
To light him to his prey,
And, like another Helen, tired another Troy!
And the king seized a flambeau with zeal to destroy;
Thais led the way,
To light him to his prey.
And, like another Helen, fired another Troy!
Thus long ago,
Ere lieaving bellows learned to blow.
While organs yet were mute;
Timotheus, to his breathing flute.
And sounding lyre.
Could swell the soul to rage, or kindle soft desire.
At last divine Cecilia came,
Inventress of the vocal frame ;
The sweet enthusiast, from her sacred store.
Enlarged the former narrow bounds,
And added length to solemn sounds.
With nature's mother-wit, and arts unknown before.
Let old Timotheus yield the prize,
Or both divide the crown;
He raised a mortal to the skies ;
She drew an angel down.
GKAND CHOKUS.
At last divine Cecilia came,
Inventress of the vocal frame ;
The sweet enthusiast, from her sacred store,
Enlarged the former narrow bounds.
And added length to solemn sounds.
With nature's mother-wit, and arts unknown before.
Let old Timotheus yield the prize,
Or both divide the crown;
He raised a mortal to the skies.
She drew an angel down.
DRYDEN.
203
A SONG FOR ST. CECILIA'S DAY.
Fkom harmony, from heavenly hannony,
This universal frame began:
When nature underneath a hea-i
Of jarring atoms lay.
And could not heave her head.
The tuneful voice was heard from high,
"Arise, ye more than dead."
Then cold, and hot, and moist, and dry,
In order to their stations leap.
And 3Iusic's power obey.
From hai-mony, from heavenly harmony
This universal frame began:
From harmony to harmony.
Through all the compass of the notes it ran,
The diapason closing full in Man.
What passion cannot Music raise and quell ?
When Jubal struck the corded shell.
His listening brethren stood around.
And, wondering, on their faces fell
To worship that celestial sound.
Less than a God they thought there could not dwell
Within the hollow of that shell.
That spoke so sweetly and so well.
What passion cannot Music raise and quell ?
The trumpet's loud clangor
Excites us to arms,
With shrill notes of anger,
And mortal alarms.
The double, double, double beat
Of the thundering drum
Cries, " Hark! the foes come;
Charge, charge, 'tis too late to retreat."
The soft complaining flute
In dying notes discovers
The woes of hopeless lovers,
Whose dirge is whispered by the warbling lute.
Sharp violins complain
Their jealous pangs and desperation,
Fury, frantic indignation.
Depth of pains, and height of passion.
For the fair disdainful dame.
But oh! what art can teach,
What human voice can reach,
The sacred organ's praise ?
Notes inspiring holy love,
Notes that wing their heavenly ways
To mend the choirs above.
204
DRTDEN.
Orpheus could lead the savage race ;
And trees uprooted left their place,
Sequacious of the lyre:
But bright Cecilia raised the wonder higher
"When to her organ vocal breath was given,
An angel heard, and straight appeared
Mistaking earth for heaven.
GRAND CHORUS.
As from the power of sacred lays
The spheres began to move,
And sung the great Creator's praise
To all the blessed above ;
So when the last and dreadful hour
This crumbling pageant shall devour.
The trumpet shall be heard on high,
The dead shall live, the living die,
And Music shall luitune the §ky.
UNDER THE PORTIIAIT OF JOHN
MIL TON.
[Prefixed to '" Paradise Lost."]
Three poets in three distant ages
born,
Greece, Italy, and England, did
adorn.
The first in loftiness of thought sur-
passed ;
The next in majesty; in both the
last,
The force of nature could no further
go;
To make a third, she joined the
former two.
YFrom Beligio Laid.]
THE LIGHT OF REASON.
Dim as the borrowed beams of moon
and stars
To lonely, weary, wandering travel-
lers.
Is reason to the soul: and as on high.
Those rolling fires discover but the
sky.
Not light us here; so Reason's glim-
mering ray
Was lent, not to assure our doubtful
way,
But guide us upward to a better day.
And as these nightly tapers disappear,
AVhen day's bright lord ascends our
hemisphere;
So i^ale grows Reason at Religion's
sight;
So dies, and so dissolves in supernat-
ural light.
[F7-oni Religio Laid.]
THE BIBLE.
If on the book itself we cast our
view,
Concuirent heathens prove the story
true ;
The doctrine, miracles; whicli must
convince.
For Heaven in them appeals to hu-
man sense:
And though they prove not, they con-
firm the cause.
When what is taught agrees with na-
ture's laws.
Then for the style, majestic and
divine.
It speaks no less than God in every
line:
Commanding words, whose force is
still the same
As the first fiat that produced our
frame.
All faiths beside, or did by arms as-
cend,
Or sense indulged has made mankind
their friend ;
This only doctrine does our lusts op-
pose :
Unfed by nature's soil, in which it
grows ;
Cross to our interests, curbing sense
and sin;
Oppressed without, and undermined
within,
It thrives through i)ain; its own tor-
mentors tires;
And with a stubborn patience still
aspires.
To what can Keason such effects as-
sign
Transcending nature, but to laws
divine ?
Which in that sacred volume are
contained;
Sufficient, clear, and for that use or-
dained.
DRY DEN.
[From lieligio Laici-I
JUDGMENT IN STUDYING IT.
The unlettered Christian, who be-
lieves in gross,
Plods on to heaven, and ne'er is at a
loss:
For the strait-gate would be made
straiter yet.
Were none admitted there but men
of wit.
The few by nature formed, with
learning fraught,
Born to instruct, as others to be
taught.
Must study well the sacred page : and
see
Which doctrine, this or that, doth
best agree
With the whole tenor of the work di-
vine ;
And plainliest points to Heaven's re-
vealed design :
Which exposition flows from genuine
sense ;
And which is forced by wit and elo-
quence.
\_From Helit/io LnicL]
THE AVOIDANCE OF RELIGIOUS
DISPUTES.
A THOUSAND daily sects rise up and
die;
A thousand more the perished race
supply;
So all we make of Heaven's discov-
ered will.
Is, not to have it, or to use it ill.
The danger's much the same; on
several shelves
If others wreck us, or we wreck our-
selves.
What then remains, but, waiving
each extreme,
The tide of ignorance and pride to
stem ?
Neither so rich a treasure to forego,
Nor proudly seek beyond our power
to know:
Faith is not built on disquisitions
vain:
The things we must believe are few
and plain :
But since men will believe more than
they nee J,
And every man will make himself a
creed,
In doubtful questions 'tis the safest
way
To learn what unsusi^ected ancients
say:
For 'tis not likely we should higher
soar
In search of Heaven, than all the
Church before :
Nor can we be deceived, unless we
see Igree.
The Scripture and the Fathers disa-
If after all they stand suspected still,
(For no man's faith depends upon
his will;)
'Tis some relief, that points no!
clearly known.
Without much hazard may be let
alone :
And after hearing what our Church
can say,
If still our reason runs another way.
That private reason 'tis more just to
curb, [disturb.
Than by disputes the public ijeace
206
DRY DEN.
For points obscure are of small use
A future cordial for a fainting mind;
to learn;
For, what was ne'er refused, all hoped
But common quiet is mankind's con-
to find.
cern.
Each in his turn, the rich might
freely come.
As to a friend; but to the poor, 'twas
home.
[From Ftconnra.]
As to some holy house the afflicted
A WIFE.
came.
The hunger-starved, the naked and
A AViFE as tender, and as true
the lame;
withal,
Want and disease both fled before
As the first -woman was before her
her name.
fall:
For zeal like hers her servants were
Made for the man, of whom she was
too slow ;
a part ;
She was the first, where need required.
Made to attract his eyes, and keep
to go;
his heart.
Herself the foundress and attendant
A second Eve, but by no crime ac-
too.
cursed ;
As beauteous, not as brittle as the
first.
Had she been first, still Paradise had
[From Eleonnra.]
been,
BEAUTIFUL DEATH.
And death had found no entrance by
her sin.
As precious gums are not for last-
So she not only had preserved from ill
ing fire.
Her sex and ours, but lived their pat-
They but perfume the temple, and
tern still.
expire:
So was she soon exhaled and van-
ished hence ;
A short sweet odor of avast expense.
[From Elcnnora.']
She vanished, we can scarcely say
CHAIUTY.
she died:
For but a now did heaven and earth
Want passed for merit at her open
divide:
door:
She passed serenely with a single
Heaven saw, he safely might increase
breath ;
his poor,
This moment perfect health, the next
And trust their sustenance with her
was death :
so well.
One sigh did her eternal bliss assure;
As not to be at charge of miracle.
So little penance needs, when souls
None could be needy, whom she saw
are almost pure.
or knew ;
As gentle dreams our waking thoughts
All in the compass of her sphere she
pursue ;
drew.
Or, one dream passed, we slide into a
He, who could touch her garment, was
new ;
as sure.
So close they follow, such wild order
As the first Christians of the apostles'
keep.
cure.
We think ourselves awake, and are
The distant heard, by fame, her pious
asleep :
deeds,
So softly death succeeded life in her:
And laid her up for their extremest
She did but di'eam of heaven, and she
needs ;
was there.
DRY DEN.
207
No pains she suffered, nor expired
with noise;
Her soul ■ was whispered out witli
God's still voice;
As an old friend is beckoned to a
feast,
And treated like a long-familiar
guest.
He took her as he found, but found
her so.
As one in hourly readiness to go:
E'en on that day, in all her trim pre-
pared ;
As early notice she from heaven had
heard ;
And some descending courier from
above [move ;
Had given her timely warning to re-
Or counselled her to dress the nuptial
room.
For on that night the bridegroom was
to come.
He kept his hour, and found her
where she lay
Clothed all in white, the livery of the
day;
Scarce had she sinned in thought, or
word , or act ;
Unless omissions were to pass for
fact:
That hardly death a consequence
could draw,
To make her liable to nature's law.
And, that she died, we only have to
show
The mortal part of her she left be-
low:
The rest, so smooth, so suddenly she
went,
Looked like translation through the
firmament.
\_From The Character of a Good Parson.]
THE MODEL rUEACHER, ^
Yet of his little he had some to
spare.
To feed the famished and to clothe
the l)are :
For mortified he was to that degree,
A poorer than himself he would not
see.
True priests, he said, and preachers
of the woi'd,
Were only stewards of their sovereign
Lord;
Nothing was theirs; but all the public
store :
Intrusted riches, to relieve the poor.
The proud he tamed, the penitent
he cheered ;
Nor to rebuke the rich offender
feared ;
His preaching much, but more his
practice wrought
(A living sermon of the truths he
taught);
For this by rules severe his life he
squared,
That all might see the doctrines
which they heard.
For priests, he said, are patterns for
the rest;
(The gold of heaven, who bear the
God impressed);
But when the precious coin is kept
unclean.
The sovereign's image is no longer
seen.
If they be foul on which the people
trust,
Well may the baser brass contract a
rust.
[^From Absalom and AchitopheL]
THE WIT.
A FIERY soul, which, working out its
way,
Fretted the pigmy body to decay,
And o'er-informed the tenement of
clay.
A daring pilot in extremity;
Pleased with the danger, when the
waves went high
He sought the storms ; but, for a calm
unfit,
Would steer too nigh the sands to
boast his wit.
Great wits are sure to madness near
allied.
And thin partitions do their bounds
divide.
208
D UNBA R — EAS TMA N.
William Dunbar.
ALL EARTHLY JOY RETURNS IX PAIN.
Have mind that age aye follows
youth ;
Death follows life with gaping mouth,
Devouring fruit and flowering grain
All earthly joy returns in pain.
Came never yet May so fresh and
green,
But January came as wud and keen ;
Was never such drout but ance came
rain;
All earthly joy returns in pain,
Since earthly joy abydis never.
Work for the joy that lasts for-
ever;
For other joy is all but vain :
All earthly joy returns in jxiin.
Charles Gamage Eastman.
A SNOW-STORM.
'Tis a fearful night in the winter
time,
As cold as it ever can be;
The roar of the blast is heard like
the chime
Of the waves of an angry sea.
The moon is full, but her silver light
The storm dashes out with its wings
to-night;
And over the sky from south to north.
Not a star is seen as the wind comes
forth
In the strength of a mighty glee.
All day had the snow come down —
all day
As it never came down before ;
And over the hills, at sunset, lay
Some two or three feet, or more ;
The fence was lost, and the wall of
* stone;
The windows blocked and the well-
curbs gone;
The haystack had grown to a moun-
tain lift,
And the wood-pile looked like a
monster drift,
As it lay by the farmer's door.
The night sets in on a world of snow,
While the air grows sharp and chill.
And the warning roar of a fearful
blow
Is heard on the distant hill;
And the Norther, see! on the moun-
tain peak
In his breath how the old trees writhe
and shriek!
He shouts on the plain, ho ho! ho ho!
He drives from his nostrils the blind-
ing snow,
And growls with a savage will.
Such a night as this to be found
abroad,
In the drifts and the freezing air,
Lies a shivering dog, in the field, by
the road.
With the snow in his shaggy hair.
He shuts his eyes to the wind and
growls ;
He lifts his head, and moans and
howls; I sleet,
Then crouching low, from the cutting
His nose is pressed on his quivering
feet —
Pray what does the dog do there ?
A farmer came from the village plain,
But he lost the travelled way ;
And for hom-s he trod with might
and main
A path for his horse and sleigh;
ELIOT.
200
But colder still the cold winds blew,
And deeper still the deep drifts
grew,
And his mare, a beautiful Morgan
brown,
At last in her struggles floundered
down,
Where a log in a hollow lay.
In vain, with a neigh and a frenzied
snort,
She plunged in the drifting snow.
While her master urged, till his
breath grew short.
With a word and a gentle blow;
But the snow was deep, and the tugs
were tight;
His hands were numb and had lost
their might:
So he wallowed back to his half-filled
sleigh.
And strave to shelter himself till day.
With his coat and butfalo.
II(^ has given the last faint jerk of
the rein,
To rouse up his dying steed ;
And the poor dog howls to the blast
in vain
For help in his master's need.
For awhile he strives with a wistful
cry
To catch a glance from his drowsy
eye,
And wags his tail when the rude winds
flap
The skirt of the buffalo over his lap,
And whines that he takes no heed.
The wind goes down and the storm
is o'er —
'Tis the hour of midnight past;
The old trees writhe and bend no more
In the whirl of the rushing blast.
The silent moon with her peaceful
light
Looks down on the hills with snow
all white.
And the giant shadow of Camel's
Hump, I stump.
The blasted pine and the ghostly
Afar on the plain are cast.
But cold and dead by the hidden log
Are they who came from the town :
The man in his sleigh, and his faith-
ful dog.
And his beautiful Morgan brown ,
In the wide sno\\-desert, far and
grand,
With his cap on his head and the
reins in his hand.
The dog with his nose on his master's
feet.
And the mare half seen through the
crusted sleet.
Where she lay when she floundered
down.
George Eliot (Marian Evans Cross)
MAY I JOIX rilE CHOIR
INVISIBLE.
O MAY I join the choir invisible
Of these immortal dead who live
again
In minds made better by their pres-
ence; live
In pulses stirred to generosity,
In deeds of daring rectitude, in scorn
Of miserable aims that end with
self.
In thoughts sublime that pierce the
night like stars,
And with their mild persistence urge
men's minds
To vaster issues.
So to live is heaven :
To make undying music ii\the world.
Breathing a beauteous order, that
controls
With growing sway the growing life
of man.
So we inherit that sweet purity
For Avhich we struggled, failed and
agonized
With widening retrospect that bre.i
despair.
m.
210
ELLIOT.
Kebellious flesh that would not be
subdueil,
A vicious parent shaming still its
child, [solved;
Poor anxious penitence, is quick dis-
Its discords quenched by meeting
harmonies.
Die in the laige and charitable air.
And all our rarer, l)etter, truer self,
That sobbed religiously in yearning
song,
That watched to ease the burden of
the world.
Laboriously tracing what must be,
And what may yet be better, — saw
within
A worthier image for the sanctuary,
And shaped it forth before the mul-
titude.
Divinely human, raising worship so
To higher reverence more mixed
with love, — [Time
That better self shall live till htunan
Shall fold its eyelids, and the human
sky
Be gathered like a scroll within the
tomb.
Unread forever.
This is life to come,
Which martyred men have made
more glorious
For us, who strive to follow.
May I reach
That purest heaven, — be to other
souls
The cup of strength in some great
agony,
Enkindle generous ardor, feed pm"e
love.
Beget the smiles that have no cruelty,
Be the sweet presence of a good dif-
fused.
And in diffusion ever more intense!
So shall I join the choir invisible,
Whose nuisic is the gladness of the
woi'ld.
Jane Elliot.
THE FLO WE US OF THE FOHEST.
I've heard the lilting at our ewe-milking.
Lasses a-lilting before the dawn of day;
But now they are moaning on ilka green loaning —
The Flowers of the Forest are a' wede away.
At buchts, in the morning, nae blithe lads are scorning,
The lasses are lonely, and dowie, and wae;
Nae daftin', nae gabbin', but sighing and sabbing.
Ilk ane lifts her leglen and hies her away.
In liairst, at the shearing, nae youths now are jeering,
The bandsters are lyart, and runkled, and gray ;
At fair, or at preaching, nae wooing, nae fleeching —
The Flowers of the Forest are a' wede away.
At e'en, at the gloaming, nae swankies are roammg,
'Bout stacks wi' the lasses at bogle to play;
But ilk ane sits drearie. lamenting her dearie —
The Flowers of the Forest are a' wede away.
Dool and wae for the order sent our lads to the border
The English, for ance, by guile wan the day;
The Flowers of the Forest, that foucht aye the foremost,
The ])rime o' our land, are cauld in the clay.
^e$
ELJAOTT.
211
W^e hear iiae mair lilting at our ewe-milking,
Women and bairns are heartless and wae;
Sighing and moaning on ilka green loaning —
Til'' Flowers of the Forest are a' wede away.
Ebenezer Elliott.
POOR AXDREW.
TnK loving poor! — So envy calls
The ever-toiling poor:
But oh! I choke, my heart grows
faint,
When I approach my door!
Behind it there are living things.
Whose silent frontlets say
They'd rather see me out than in. —
Feet foremost borne away !
My heart grows sick when home I
come, —
May God the thought forgive!
If 'twere not for my dog and cat.
I think I could not live.
My dog and cat, when I come home.
Run out to welcome me, —
She mewing, Avith her tail on end.
While wagging his comes he.
They listen for my homeward steps.
My smothered sob they hear,
When down my heart sinks, deathly
down,
■ Because my home is near.
My heart grows faint when home I
come, —
May God the thought forgive !
If 'twere not for my dog and cat,
I think I could not live.
I'd rather be a happy bird,
Tlian, scorned and loathed, a king;
But man should live while for him
lives
The meanest loving thing.
Thou busy bee ! how canst thou choose
So far and wide to roam ?
O blessed bee! thy glad wings say
Thou hast a happy home !
But I, when I come home, — O God!
Wilt thou the thought forgive ?
If 'twere not for my dog and cat,
I think I could not live.
They do not
Why come they not
come
My breaking heart to meet!
A heavier darkness on me falls, —
1 cannot lift my feet.
Oh, yes. they come! — they never fail
To listen for my sighs ;
My poor heart brightens when it
meets
The sunshine of their eyes.
Again they come to meet me. — God !
Wilt thou the thought foi-give ?
If 'twere not for my dog and cat,
I think I could not live.
This heart is like a churchyard stone;
My home is comfort's grave;
My playful cat and honest dog
Are all the friends 1 have;
And yet my house is filled with
friends, —
But foes they seem, and are.
AVhat makes them hostile? Igno-
hance;
Then let me not despair.
But oh ! I sigh when home I come,—
May God the thought forgive !
If 'twere not for my dog and cat,
I think I could not live.
THE PUESS.
God sail,— " Let there be light! "
Grim darkness felt his might.
And fled away:
Then startled seas and mountains
cold
Shone forth, all bright in blue and
gold,
And cried, — "'Tis day! 'tis day!"
" Hail, holy light!" exclaimed
The thunderous cloud that flamed
O'er daisies white;
212
ELLIOTT.
And lo ! the rose, in crimson dressed,
Leaned sweetly on tlie lily's breast;
And, blushing, niurnmred, —
"Light!"
Then was tlie skylark born ;
Then rose the eniljattled corn ;
Then floods of praise
Flowed o'er the sunny hills of noon;
And then, in stillest night, the moon
Poured forth her pensive lays.
Lo, heaven's bright bow is glad!
Lo, trees and flowers, all clad
In glory, bloom!
And shall the mortal sons of God
Be senseless as the trodden clod,
And darker than the tomb ?
No, by the mind of man!
By the swart artisan !
By God, our sire!
Our souls have holy Hght within;
And every form of grief and sin
Shall see and feel its fire.
By earth, and hell, and heaven.
The shroud of souls is riven !
Mind, mind alone
Is light, and hope, and life, and power !
Earth's deepest night, from this
blessed hour,
The night of nnnds, is gone !
" The Press! " all lands shall sing;
The Press, the Press we bring.
All lands to bless :
Oh, pallid Want! Oh, Labor stark!
Beliold we bring the second ark I
The Press ! the Press ! the Press !
THE POET'S PRAYER.
Almighty Father! let thv lowly
child.
Strong in his love of truth, be
wisely bold, —
A patriot bard, by sycophants reviled,
Let him live usefully, and not die
old !
Let poor men's children, pleased to
read his lays.
Love, for his sake, the scenes where
he hath been,
And when he ends his pilgrimage of
days.
Let him be buried where the grass
is green.
Where daisies, blooming earliest,
linger late
To hear the bee his busy note pro-
long;
There let him slumber, and in peace
await
The dawning morn, far from the
sensual throng.
Who scorn the windflower's blush,
the redbreast's lonely song.'
to
XOT FOR NAUGHT.
Do and suffer naught in vain;
Let no trifle trifling be!
If the salt of life is pain.
Let even wrongs bring good
thee ;
Good to others few or many, —
Good to all, or good to any.
If men curse thee, plant their lies
Where for truth they best may
grow;
Let the railers make thee wise.
Preaching peace where'er thou go!
God no useless plant hath i)lanted,
Evil — wisely used — is wanted.
If the nation-feeding corn
Thriveth under iced snow;
If the small bird on the tliorn
Useth well its guarded sloe. —
Bid thy cares thy comforts double.
Gather fruit from thorns of trouble.
See the rivers ! how they run.
Strong in gloom, and strong in
light!
Like the never-wearied sun,
Through the day and through the
night.
Each along his path of duty,
Turning coldness into beauty.
EMERSON.
213
Ralph Waldo Emerson.
ODE.
O TENDEELY the haughty day
Fills his blue urn with tire;
One morn is in the mighty heaven,
And one in our desire.
The cannon booms from town to
town,
Our pulses are not less.
The joy-bells chime their tidings
tlown,
Which children's voices bless.
For he that flung the broad blue fold
O'er mantling land and sea.
One third part of the sky unrolled
For the banner of the free.
The men are ripe of Saxon kind
To build an equal state, —
To take the statute from the mind.
And make of duty fate.
United States! the ages plead, —
Present and past in under-song, —
Go put your creed into your deed.
Nor speak with double tongue.
For sea and land don't understand.
Nor skies without a frown
See rights for which the one hand
fights
By the other cloven down.
Be just at home ; then write your scroll
Of honor o'er the sea,
And bid the broad Atlantic roll
A ferry of the free.
And, henceforth, there shall be no
chain,
Save underneath the sea
The wires shall murmur through the
main
Sweet songs of Liberty.
The conscious stars accord above.
The waters wild below.
And under, through the cable wove.
Her fiery errands go.
For he that worketh high and wise,
Nor pauses in his plan.
Will take the sun out of the skies
Ere freedom out of man.
THE PUOBLEM.
I LIKE a church; I like a cowl;
1 love a prophet of the soul;
And on my heart monastic aisles
Fall like sweet strains, or pensive
smiles ;
Yet not for all his faith can see
AVould 1 that cowleil churchman be.
AVhy should the vest on him allure.
Which 1 coidd not on me endure ?
Not from a vain or shallow thought
His awful Jove young Phidias
brought.
Never from lips of cunning, fell
The thrilling Delphic oracTe;
Out from the heart of nature rolled
The burdens of the Bible old ;
The litanies of nations came.
Like the volcano's tongue of flame.
Up from the burning core below, —
The canticles of love and woe ;
The hand that rounded Peter's dome.
And groined the aisles of Christian
Rome,
Wrought in a sad sincerity ;
Himself from God he could not free :
He builded better than he knew; —
The conscious stone to beauty grew.
Kuowest thou what wove yon wood-
bird's nest
Of leaves, and feathers from her
breast ?
Or how the fish outbuilt her shell.
Painting with morn each aniuial cell ?
Or how the sacred pine-tree adds
To her old leaves new myriads ?
Such and so grew these holy piles.
Whilst love and terror laid the tiles.
Earth proudly wears the Parthenon,
As the l)est gem upon her zone;
214
EMERSON.
And morning opes with liaste lier lids,
To gaze upon the Pyramids ;
O'er England's abbeys bends the sky,
As on its friends, with kindred eye;
For out of thought's interior sphere.
These wonders rose to upper air;
And nature gladly gave them place.
Adopted them into her race.
And granted them an equal date
Witli Andes and with Ararat.
Tliese temples grew as grows the
grass ;
Art might obey, but not surpass.
The passive Master lent his hand
To the vast soul that o'er him
planned;
And the same power that reared the
shrine
Bestrode the tribes that knelt within.
Ever the fiery Pentecost
Girds with one tlanie the countless
host.
Trances the heart through chanting
choirs,
xVnd through the priest the mind in-
spires.
The word imto the prophet spoken
Was writ on tables yet unbroken ;
The word by seers or sibyls tohl,
In groves of oak, or fanes of gold,
Still floats upon the morning wind,
Still whispers to the willing mind.
One accent of the Holy Ghost
The heedless world hath never lost.
I know what say the fathers wise, —
The Book itself before me lies,
Old Chrysostom, best Augustine,
And he who blent both in his line.
The younger Golden Lips or mines,
Taylor, the Shakespeare of divines.
His words are nuisic in my ear,
1 see his cowled portrait dear;
And yet, for all his faith could see,
I would not the good bishop be.
THE RHODOnA.
In May, when sea-winds pierced our
solitudes,
I found the fresh Rhodora In the
woods.
Spreading its leafless blooms in a
damp nook,
To please the desert and the sluggish
brook.
The purple petals, fallen in the pool.
Made the black water with their
beauty gay ;
Here might the red-bird come his
plumes to cool,
And court the flower that cheapens
his array.
Rhodora! if the sages ask thee why
This charm is wasted on the earth
and sky,
Dear, tell them, that if eyes were
made for seeing,
Then beauty is its own excuse for
being:
Why thou wert there, oh. rival of the
rose !
I never thought to ask, 1 never knew :
But in my simple ignorance, suppose
The selfsame power that brought nie
there, brought you.
THE HUMBLE-BEE.
Bi ui.v, dozing humble-bee.
Where thou art is clime for me.
Let them sail for Porto Ricjue,
Far-off heats through seas to seek;
I will follow thee alone.
Thou animated torrid-zone !
Zigzag steerer, desert cheei'er.
Let me chase thy waving lines:
Keep me nearer, me thy liearer,
Singing over shrubs and vines.
Insect lover of the sun,
Joy of thy dominion!
.Sailor of the atmosphere;
SwimuKM- through tlie waves of air;
Voyager of light and noon;
Epicurean of June;
Wait, I prithee, till I come
Within earshot of thy hum, —
All without is martyrdom.
When the south-wind, in May days,
With a net of shining haze
Silvers the horizon wall.
And, with softness touching all.
THE CONCORD BRIDGE.
Page 215.
EMERSON.
215
Tints the human countenance
With a color of romance.
And, infusing subtle iieats,
Turns the sod to violets,
Thou, in sunny solitudes,
Rover of tlie underwoods,
Tlie green silence dost displace
With tliy mellow, breezy bass.
Hot midsummer's petted crone,
Sweet to me thy drowsy tone
Tells of countless sunny hours.
Long days, and solid banks of flowers :
Of gulfs of sweetness Avithout boiuid
In Indian wildernesses found;
Of Syrian peace, innnortal leisure.
Firmest cheer, and bird-like pleasure.
Aught imsavory or unclean
Hath my insect never seen;
But violets and bilberry l)ells,
Maple-sap, and daffodils,
Grass witli green flag lialf-mast higb,
Succory to match the sky,
Columbine with horn of honey.
Scented fern and agrimony,
Clover, catchfly, adder' s-tongue.
And brier-roses, dwelt among;
All beside was unknown waste,
All was picture as lie passed.
Wiser far than luunan seer.
Yellow-breeclied philosopher I
Seeing only what is fair.
Sipping only wliat is sweet.
Thou dost mock at fate and care.
Leave the cliaff, and take the wlieat.
When the fierce nortliwestern blast
Cools sea and land so far and fast,
Thou already slumberest deep;
Woe and want thou canst outsleep;
Want and woe, which torture us.
Thy sleep makes ridiculous.
CONCORD FIGHT.
By the rude bridge tliat arched the
flood,
Tlieir flag to April' s breeze vmfurled ,
Here once tlie embattled farmers
stood.
And fired the shot heard round tlie
world.
The foe long since in silence slept;
Alike the conqueror silent sleeps ;
And time the ruined bridge has swept
Down the dark stream wliicli sea-
ward creeps.
On this green bank, by tliis soft
stream.
We set to-day a votive stone;
That memory may tlieir deed redeem,
Wlien, like our sires, our sons are
gone.
Spirit, that made tliose heroes dare
To die, and leave their children
free.
Bid time and nature gently spare
The shaft we raise to them and
tliee.
FOnnKAIlANCE.
Hast thou named all tlie birds with-
out a gun ?
Loved tlie wood-rose, and left it on
its stalk ?
At rich men's tables eaten bread and
pulse ?
Unarmed, faced danger with a lieart
of trust '?
And loved so well a higli behavior,
In man or maid, that tliou from
speech refrained,
Nobility more nobly to repay ?
Oh. be my friend, "and teach me to
be thine !
216
FABER.
Frederic William Faber.
THE lUdHT MUST WIS.
Oh, it is hard to work for God,
To rise and talce liis part
Upon tliis battle-field of earth,
And not sometimes lose heart !
He hides himself so wondrously,
As though there A\ere no God;
He is least seen when all the powers
Of ill are most abroad.
Or he deserts us at the hour
The fight is all but lost;
And seems to leave us to ourselves
Just when we need him most.
Ill masters good, good seems to change
To ill with greatest ease;
And, worst of all, the good with good
Is at cross-purposes.
Ah ! God is other than we think :
His ways are far above,
Far beyond reason's height, and
reached
Only by childlike love.
Workman of God ! oh, lose not heart,
But learn what God is like;
And in the darkest battle-field
Thou shalt know M'here to strike.
Thrice blest is he to whom is given
The instinct that can tell
That God is on the field when he
Is most invisible.
Blest, too, is he who can divine
Where real right doth lie,
And dares to take the side
seems
Wrong to man's blindfold eye.
that
For right is right, since God is God;
And right the day must win;
To doubt wouhl be disloyalty,
To falter would be sin!
HARSH JUDGMENTS.
O God! whose thoughts are brightest
light.
Whose love runs always clear,
To whose kind wistlom, sinning souls.
Amid their sins, ai'e dear, —
Sweeten my bitter-thoughted heart
AVith charity like thine.
Till self shall be the only si)Ot
On earth that does not shine.
Hard-heartedness dwells not with
souls
Bound whom thine arms are drawn ;
And dai-k thoughts fade away in
grace,
Like cloud-spots in the dawn.
Time was when I believed that wi ong
In others to detect
Was part of genius, and a gift
To cherish, not reject.
Now, better taught by thee, O Lord !
This truth dawns on my mind.
The best effect of heavenly light
Is earth's false eyes to blind.
He whom no praise can reach is aye
Men's least attempts approving;
Whom justice makes all-merciful,
Omniscience makes all-loving.
When we ourselves least kindly are.
We deem the world unkind :
Dark hearts, in flowers where honey
lies.
Only the poison find.
How Thou canst think so w ell of us,
Yet be the God Thou art,
Is darkness to my intellect,
But sunshine to my heart.
Yet habits linger in the soul;
More grace, O Lord ! more grace;
More sweetness from thy loving heart,
More sunshine from tbv face!
FALCONER.
21-
LOW SPIRITS.
Fever and fret and aimless stir
And disappointed strife,
All chafing, unsuccessful things.
Make up the sum of life.
Love adds anxiety to toil,
And sameness doubles cares.
While one unbroken chain of work
The flagging temper wears.
The light and air are dulled with
smoke ;
The streets resound with noise;
And the soul sinks to see its peers
Chasing their joyless joj's.
Voices are round me; smiles are
near;
Kind welcomes to be had ;
And yet my spirit is alone,
Fretful, outworn, and sad.
A weary actor, I would fain
Be quit of my long part;
The burden of unquiet life
Lies heg,vy on my heart.
Sweet thought of God! now do thy
work.
As thou hast done before ;
Wake up, and tears will wake with
thee.
And the dull mood be o'er.
The very thinking of the thought
Without or praise or prayer,
Gives light to know and life to do.
And marvellous strength to bear.
Oh, there is music in that thought,
L^nto a heait unstrung.
Like sweet bells at the evening time,
Most musically rung.
'Tis not His justice or His power.
Beauty or blest abode.
But the mere unexpanded thought
Of the eternal God.
It is not of His wondrous works,
Not even that He is ;
Words fail it, but it is a thought
Which by itself is bliss.
Sweet thought, lie closer to my heart!
Thus I may feel thee near.
As one who for his weapon feels
In some nocturnal fear.
Mostly in hours of gloom, thou
com'st.
When sadness makes us loviy.
As though thou wert the echo sweet
Of humble melancholy.
I bless Thee, Lord, for this kind
check
To spirits over-free !
And for all things that make me feel
More helpless need of Thee !
William Falconer.
iFrom The Shipwreck.]
WliECKED IN THE TEMPEST.
AxD noAv, while winged with ruin
from on high.
Through the rent cloud the ragged
lightnings fly,
A flash quick glancing on the neiwes
of light.
Struck the pale helmsman witli eter-
nal night:
Quick to the abandoned wheel Arion
came.
The ship's tempestuous sallies to re-
claim.
Amazed he saw her, o'er the sound-
ing foam
Upborne, to right and left distracted
roam.
So gazed young Phaeton, with pale
dismay.
When, mounted on the flaming car
of (lav.
^^^i
218
FALCONER.
With rash and impious hand the
stripUng tried
The iniuiortal coursers of the sun to
guide.
With mournful look the seamen
eyed the strand.
Where death's inexorable jaws ex-
pand ;
Swift from their minds elapsed all
dangers past,
As, dumb with terror, they beheld
the last.
And now, lashed on by destiny se-
vere,
AVith horror fraught the dreadful
scene drew near!
The ship hangs hovering on the verge
of death.
Hell yawns, rocks rise, and breakers
roar beneath !
In vain, alas! the sacred shades of
yore.
Would arm the mind with philosophic
lore; [breath,
In vain they'd teach us, at the latest
To smile serene amid the pangs of
death.
Even Zeno's self, and Epictetus old.
This fell abyss had shuddered to be-
hold.'
Had Socrates, for godlike virtue
famed,
And wisest of the sons of men pro-
claimed,
Beheld this scene of frenzy and dis-
tress.
His soul had trembled to its last re-
cess!
O yet confirm my heart, ye powers
above.
This last tremendous shock of fate
to prove !
The tottering frame of reason yet
sustain !
Nor let this total ruin whirl my brain !
In vain the cords and axes were pre-
pared.
For now the audacious seas insult
the yard ;
High o'er the ship they throw a hor-
rid shade,
And o'erher burst, in terrible cascade.
Uplifted on the surge, to heaven she
flies.
Her shattered top half buried in the
skies,
Then headlong plunging thunders on
the ground.
Earth groans, air trembles, and the
deeps resound !
Her giant bulk the dread concussion
feels,
And quivering with the wound, in
torment reels;
Again she plunges; hark! a second
shock
Tears her strong bottom on the mar-
ble rock !
Down on the vale of death, with dis-
mal cries.
The fated victims shuddering roll
their eyes
In wild despair; while yet another
stroke.
With deep convulsion, rends the solid
oak:
Till, like the mine, in whose infernal
cell
The lurking demons of destruction
dwell,
At length asunder torn her frame
divides,
And crashing spreads in ruin o'er the
tides.
[From The Shipu^reck:]
A SUiVSET PICTURE.
The sun's bright orb, declining all
serene,
Now glanced obliquely o'er the wood-
land scene;
Creation smiles around ; on every
spray
The warbling birds exalt their even-
ing lay ;
Blithe skipping o"er yon hill, the
fleecy train
Join the deep chorus of the lowing
plain;
The golden lime and orange there
were seen
On fragrant branches of perpetual
green;
The crystal streams that velvet mead-
ows lave,
To the green ocean roll with chiding
wave.
The glassy ocean, hushed, forgets to
roar ;
But trembling, murmurs on the sandy
shore;
And, lo! his surface lovely to behold.
Glows in the west, a sea of living
gold!
While all above a thousand liveries
gay
The skies with poini) ineffable array.
Arabian sweets perfume the happy
plains;
Above, beneath, around, enchant-
ment reigns
While glowing Vesper leads the starry
train.
And Night slow draws her veil o'er
land and main,
Emerging clouds the azure east in-
vade.
And wrap the lucid spheres in grad-
ual shade;
While yet the songsters of the vocal
grove
With dying numbers tune the soul to
love.
Edgar Fawcett.
IDEALS.
O SciENCK, whose footsteps wander.
Audacious and unafraid,
Where the mysteries that men pon-
der
Lie folded in awful shade,
Though you bring us, with calm defi-
ance,
Dear gifts from the bourns you
wing,
There is yet, O undaunted Science,
One gift that you do not bring !
Shall you conquer the last restriction
That conceals it from you now.
And come back with its benediction
Like an aureole on your brow ?
Shall you fly to us, roamer daring.
Past barriers of time and space.
And return from your mission bear-
ing
The light of God on your face ?
We know not, but still can treasure.
In the yearnings of our suspense,
Consolation we may not measure
By the certitudes of Sense.
For Life, as we long and question.
Seems to si)eak, while it hurries by.
Through undertones of suggestion
Immortality's deep reply.
To ears that await its token
Perpetually it strays.
Indeterminate, fitful, broken.
By the discords of our days.
It pierces the grim disasters
Of clamorous human Hate,
And its influence overmasters
All the Ironies of Fate.
The icy laugh of the scorner
Cannot strike its echoes mute;
It cleaves the moan of the mourner
Like a clear leolian lute;
At its tone less clear and savage
Gro^^■s the anguish of f areweU tears,
And its melody haunts the ravage
Of the desecrating years.
Philosophy builds, and spares not
Her firm, laborious power.
But her lordly edifice wears not
Its last aerial tower.
For the quarries of Keason fail her
Ere the structure's perfect scope.
And the stone that would now avail
her [hope.
Must be hewn from heights of
But Art, at her noblest glory.
Can seem, to her lovers fond,
As divinely admonitory
Of infinitudes beyond.
mm
•2-20
FAWCETT.
She can beam upon Earth's abase-
ments
Like a splendor flung down sublime
Through vague yet exalted casements
From eternity into time.
On the canvas of some great painter
We may trace, in its varied flame,
Now leaping aloft, now fainter,
As the mood uplifts the aim,
That impulse by whose rare presence
His venturing brush has drawn
Its hues from the efflorescence
Of a far Elysian dawn.
An impassioned watcher gazes
Where the faultless curves combine
That sculpture's mightier phases
Imperially enshrine.
And he feels that by strange election
The artificer's genius wrought
From the marble a pale perfection
That is paramount over thought.
So at music entranced we wonder,
If its cliarm the spii'it seeks,
When with mellow voluminous thun-
der
A sovereign maestio speaks.
Till it seems that by ghostly aidance
Upraised above lesser throngs,
He has caught from the stars their
cadence
And woven the wind into songs.
More than all, if the stately brilliance
Of a poet's rapture rise,
Like a fountain wliose full resilience
Is lovely against fair skies.
Are we thrilled with a dream un-
bounded
Of deeps by no vision scanned.
That conjecture has never sounded
And conception has never spanned.
So the harvest that knowledge misses,
Intuition seems to reap ;
One pauses before the abysses
That one will delight to leap.
One balks the ruminant sages.
And one bids the world aspire.
While the slow processional ages
Irreversibly retire.
WOUNDS.
The night-wind sweeps its viewless
lyre,
And o'er dim lands, at pastoral rest,
A single star's white heart of fire
Is throbbing in the amber west.
I track a rivulet, while 1 roam.
By banks that copious leafage cools,
And watclx it roughening into foam,
Or deepening into glassy pools.
And where the shy stream gains a
glade
That willowy thickets overwhelm,
I find a cottage in the shade
Of one higli patriarchal elm.
Unseen, I mark, well bowered from
reach,
A group tlie sloping lawn displays,
And more by gestures than by speech
I learn their converse' while I gaze.
In curious band, youth, maid, and
dame.
About his chair they throng to
greet
A gaunt old man of crippled frame,
Whose crutch leans idle at his feet.
Girt with meek twilight's peaceful
breath, [fray,
They hear of loud, tempestuous
Of troops mown down like wheat by
death,
Of red Antietam's ghastly day.
He tells of hurts that will not heal;
Of aches that nerve and sinew fret.
Where sting of shot and bite of steel
Have left their dull mementos yet;
And touched by pathos, filled with
praise.
His gathered hearers closer press,
To pay alike in glance or phrase,
Eesponse of pitying tenderness.
But I, who note their kindly will.
Look onward, past the box-edged
walk, [still.
Where stands a woman, grave and
Oblivious of their fleeting talk.
FAIVCETT.
Her listless arms droop either side ;
In pensive grace her brow is bent;
Her slender form leaves half-descried
A sweet fatigued abandonment.
And while she lures my musing eye,
The mournful reverie of her air
Speaks to my thought, I know not
why,
In the stern dialect of despair.
Lone wistful moods it seems to show
Of anguish borne through lagganl
years.
With outward calm, \\ ith secret flow
Of unalleviating tears.
It breathes of duty's daily strife.
When jaded effort loathes to strive ;
Of patience lingering firm, when life
Is tired of being yet alive.
Enthralled by this fair, piteous face,
While heaven is purpling overhead,
No more 1 heed the old soldier trace
How sword has cut, or bullet sped.
I dream of sorrow's noiseless fight.
Where no blades ring, no cannon
roll,
And where the shadowy blows that
smite
Give bloodless wounds that s:-ar
the soul ;
Of fate unmoved by desperate prayers
From those its plunderous wrath
lays low;
Of bivouacs where the spirit stares
At smouldering passion's faded
glow;
And last, of that sad armistice made
On the dark field whence hope has
fled,
Ere yet, like some poor ghost unlaid,
Pale Memory glides to count her
dead.
THE WOOD-TURTLE.
Girt with the grove's aerial sigh.
In clumsy stupor, deaf as fate,
Near this coiled, naked root you lie.
Imperviously inanimate.
Between these woodlands where we
met.
And your grim languor, void of
grace.
My glance, dumb sylvan anchoret.
Mysterious kinsmanship can trace.
For in your checkered shape are shown
The miry black of swamp and bog,
The tawny brown of lichened stone.
The inertness of the tumbled log.
But when you break this lifeless pause.
And from your parted shell out-
spread
A rude array of lumbering claws,
A length of lean, dark snaky head,
I watch from sluggish torpor start
These vital signs, uncouth and
strange.
And mutely murmur to my heart:
"Ah me! how lovelier were the
change,
" If yonder tough oak, seamed with
scars.
Could give some white, wild form
release,
With eyes amid whose wistful stars
Burned memories of immortal
Greece!"
222
FAY — FENNER.
Anna Maria Fay.
SLEEP AND DEATH.
Oft see we in the garish round of
day
A danger-haunted world for our
sad feet,
Or fear we tread along the peopled
street
A homeless path, an inicompan-
ioned way.
So too the night doth bring its own
array
Of darkling terrors we must singly
meet.
Each soul apart in its unknown re-
treat,
With life a purposeless, uncon-
scious play.
But though the day discovers us
afraid.
Unsure of some safe hand to be
our guide.
Rest we at night, as if for each
were said.
" He giveth unto His beloved sleep."
Nought less than all do we in sleep
confide,
And death but needs of us a trust
as deep.
RONDEL.
AViiK.x love is in her eyes.
What need of Spring for me ?
A brighter emerald lies
On hill and vale and lea.
The azure of the skies
Holds nought so sweet to see,
When love is in her eyes.
What need of Spring for me ?
Her bloom the rose outvies.
The lily dares no plea.
The violet's glory dies.
No flower so sweet can be ;
When love is in her eyes,
What need of Spring for me ?
Cornelius George Fenner.
GULF-WEED.
A WEARY weed, tossed to and fro.
Drearily drenched in the ocean
brine.
Soaring high and sinking low,
Lashed along without will of mine;
Sport of the spume of the surging sea;
Flung on the foam, afar and anear,
Mark my manifold mystery, —
Growth and grace in their place
appear.
1 bear round berries, gray and red,
Rootless and rover though I be;
My spangled leaves, when nicely
spread.
Arboresce as a trunkless tree ;
Corals curious coat me o'er,
White and hard in apt array ;
'Mid the wild waves' rude uproar,
Gracefully grow I, night and day.
Hearts there are on the sounding
shore.
Something whispers soft to me.
Restless and roaming for evermore.
Like this weary weed of the sea;
Bear they yet on each beating breast
The eternal type of the wondrous
whole :
Growth unfolding amidst unrest,
Grace informing with silent soul.
FIELDS.
223
ANNIE Fields.
TO SAPPHO.
Daughter of Love ! Out of the flow-
ing river,
Bearing the tide of life upon its bil-
low,
Down to that gulf where love and
song together
Sink and must perish :
Out of that fatal and resistless cur-
rent.
One little song of thine to thy great
mother.
Treasured upon the heart of earth
forever,
Alone is rescued.
Yet when spring comes, and weary is
the spirit.
When love is here, but absent is the
lover.
And life is here, and only love is dy-
ing?
Then turn we, longing,
Singer, to thee ! Through ages unf or-
gotteu ;
Where beats the heart of one who in
her loving
Sang, all for love, and gave herself
in singing
To the sea's bosom.
[From The Last Contest of JEschylus.]
YOUNG SOPHOCLES TAKING THE
PRIZE FROM AGED ^SCHYLUS.
But now the games succeeded, then
a pause.
And after came the judges with the
scrolls ;
Two scrolls, not one, as in departed
years.
And this saw none but the youth,
Sophocles,
Who stood with head erect and shin-
ing eyes,
As if the beacon of some promised
land
Caught his strong vision and en-
tranced it there.
Then while the earth made mimicry
of heaven
With stillness, calmly spake the
mightiest judge:
"O yEschylus! The father of our
song!
Athenian master of the tragic lyre
Thou the incomparable! Swayer of
strong hearts!
Immortal minstrel of immortal deeds !
The autumn grows apace, and all
must die;
Soon winter comes, and silence.
^schylus!
After that silence laughs the tuneful
spring !
Read'st thou our meaning through
this slender veil
Of nature's weaving? Sophocles,
stand forth!
Behold Fame calls thee to her loftiest
seat.
And bids thee wear her crown. Stand
forth, I say!"
Then, like a fawii, the youthful poet
sprang
From the dark thicket of new crowd-
ing friends.
And stood, a straight, lithe form with
gentle mien,
(/rowned first with light of happiness
and youth.
But ^schylus, the old man, bending
lower
Under this new chief weight of all
the years,
Turned from that scene, turned from
the shouting crowd.
Whose every voice wounded his dying
soul
With arrows poison-dipped, and
walked alone.
Forgotten, under plane-trees, by the
stream.
"The last! The last! Have I no more
to do
With this sweet world ! Is the bright
morning now
No longer fraught for me with crowd-
ing song ?
Will evening bring no unsought fruit-
age home ?
Must the days pass and these poor
lips be dumb,
While strewing leaves sing falling
through the air,
And autumn gathers in her richest
fruit '?
Where is my spring departed? Where,
O gods !
AVithin my spirit still the building
birds
I hear, with voice more tender than
when leaves
Are budding and the happy earth is
gay-
Am I, indeed, grown dumb for ever-
more !
Take me. O bark! Take me, thou
flowing stream!
Who knowest nought of death save
when thy waves
Piush to new life upon the ocean's
breast.
Bear thou me singing to the under
world !
[From Soplioclei.]
AGED SOPHOCLES ADDRESSING THE
ATHENIANS BEFORE READING HIS
(ED IPC'S COLONEUy.
Bowed half with age and half with
reverence, thus,
I, Sophocles, now answer to your
call;
Questioned have I the cause and the
reason learned.
Lo, 1 am here that all the world may
see
These feeble limbs that signal of de-
cay!
But, know ye, ere the aged oak must
die.
Long after the strong years have
bent his form,
The spring still gently weaves a leafy
crown,
Fresh as of yore to deck his wintry
head.
And now, O people mine, who have
loved my song,
Ye shall be judges if the spring have
brought
Late unto me, the aged oak, a crown.
Hear yc once more, ere yet the river
of sleej)
Bear me away far on its darkening
tide.
The music breathed upon me fi-om
these fields.
If to your ears, alas! the shattered
strings
No longer sing, but breathe a discord
harsh,
I will return and draw this mantle
close
About my head and lay me down to
die.
But if ye hear the wonted spirit call,
Framing the natural song that fills
this world
To a diviner form, then shall ye all
believe
The love I bear to those most near to
me
Is living still, and living cannot
wrong;
To me, it seems, the love I bear to
thee,
Athens, blooms fresh as violets in yon
wood,
Making new spring within this aged
breast.
AT THE FORGE.
I AM Ilephaistos, and forever here
Stand at the forge and labor, while I
dream
Of those who labor not and are not
lame.
I hear the early and the late birds
call,
Hear winter whisper to the coming
s])ring.
And watch the feet of summer danc-
ing light
For joy across the bosom of the earth.
Labor endures, but all of these must
pass !
And ye who love them best, nor are
condemned
FIELDS.
225
To beat the anvil through the sum-
mer day,
May learn the secret of their sudden
flight;
No mortal tongue may whisper wliere
they hide,
But to her love, half nestled in the
grass.
Earth lias been known to whisper low
yet clear
Strange consolation for the wintry
days.
Oh, listen then, ye singers! learn and
tell
• Those who must labor by the dusty
way!
PASSAGE FROM THE PRELUDE.
YOUTH of the world,
Tliou wert sweet !
In thy bud
Slept nor canker nor pain;
In ihe blood
Of thy graije was no frost and n(
rain;
1 love thee! I follow thy feet !
The youth of my heart,
And the deathless fire
Leap to embrace thee :
And nlgher, and nigher,
Through tlie darkness of grief and
the smart.
Thy form do I see.
But the tremulous hand of the years
Has brought me a friend.
Beautiful gift beyond price I
Beyond loss, beyond tears!
Hither she stands, clad in a veil.
O thou youth of tlie world !
She was a stranger to thee,
Thou didst fear her and flee.
Sorrow is her name ;
And the face of Sorrow is pale;
But her heart is aflame
With a fire no winter can tame.
Her love will not bend
To the storm.
To the voices of pleasure.
Nor faint in the arms of the earth ;
But she followeth ever the form
Of the Master whose promise is sure.
Who knows both our death and oiu"
birth. .
James Thomas Fields.
MORNING AND EVENING BY THE
SEA.
At dawn the fleet stretched miles
away
On ocean-plains asleep, —
Trim vessels waiting for the day
To move across the deep.
So still the sails they seemed to be
White lilies growing in the sea.
When evening touched the cape's
low rim.
And dark fell on the waves,
We only saw processions dim
Of clouds, from shadowy caves ;
These were the ghosts of buried ships
Gone down in one brief hour's
eclipse !
THE PERPETUITY OF SONG.
It was a blithesome young jongleur
Who started out to sing.
Eight hundred years ago, or more.
On a leafy morn in spring;
And he carolled sweet as any bird
That ever tried its wing.
Of love his little heart was full, —
Madonna ! how he sang !
The blossoms trembled with delight,
And round about him sprang,
As forth among tlie banks of Loire
The minstrel's music rang.
The boy had left a home of want
To wander up and down.
And sing for bread and nightly rest
In many an alien town.
And bear whatever lot befell, —
The alternate smile and frown.
The singer's carolling lips are dust.
And ages long since then
Dead kings have lain beside their
thrones,
Voiceless as common men, —
But Gerald's songs are echoing still
Through every mountain glen!
/.V EXTREMIS.
On. the soul-haunting shadows when
low he'll lie dying,
And the dread angel's voice for his
spirit is crying!
Where will his thoughts wander, just
before sleeping,
When a chill from the dark o'er his
forehead is creeping ?
Will he go on beguiling.
And wantonly smiling ?
'Tis June with him now, but quick
cometh December ;
There's a broken heart somewhere
for him to remember.
And sure as God liveth, for all his
gay trolling.
The bell for his passing one day will
be tolling!
Then no more beguiling.
False vowing and smiling!
A PROTEST.
Go, sophist! dare not to despoil
My life of what it sorely needs
In days of pain, in hours of toil, —
The bread on which my spirit
feeds.
You see no light beyond the stars.
No hope of lasting joys to come ?
I feel, thank God, no narrow bars
Iletween me and my final home!
Hence with your cold sepulcliral
bans, —
The vassal doubts Unfaith has
given !
My childhood's heart within the
man's
Still whispers to me, "Trust in
Heaven ! ' '
COURTESY.
How sweet and gracious, even in
common speech.
Is that fine sense which men call
Courtesy !
Wholesome as air and genial as the
light,
Welcome in every clime as breath of
flowers, —
It transnmtes aliens into trusting
friends.
And gives its owner passport round
the globe.
A CHARACTER.
O HAPPIEST he, whose riper years
retain
The hopes of youth, unsullied by a
stain!
His eve of life in calm content shall
glide,
Like the still streamlet to tlie ocean
tide:
No gloomy cloud hangs o'er his tran-
quil day;
No meteor lures him from his home
astray ;
For him there glows with glittering
beam on high
Love's changeless star that leads him
to the sky ;
Still to the past he sometimes turns
to trace
The mild expression of a mother's
face.
And dreams, perchance, as oft in
earlier years.
The low, sweet music of her voice he
hears.
FINCH.
2-11
FIRST APPEARANCE AT THE ODEON.
"I AM Nicholas Tacchinardi, — hunchbacked, look you, and a fright;
Caliban himself might never interpose so foul a sight.
Granted; but 1 come not, masters, to exhibit form or size.
Gaze not on my limbs, good people; lend your ears, and not your e//e.s.
I'm a singer, not a ditncer, — spare me for a while your din;
Let me try my voice to-night here, — keep your jests till 1 begin.
Have the kindness but to listen, — this is all I dare to ask.
See, I stand beside the footlights, waiting to begin my task,
If I fail to please you, curse me, — not before my voice you hear.
Thrust- me not from the Odeon. Hearken, and I've naught to fear."
Then the crowd in pit and boxes jeered the dwarf, and mocked his shape;
Called him "monster." "thing abhorrent," crying, "Off, presumptuous ape !
Off, vmsightly, baleful creature! off, and quit the insulted stage!
Move aside, repulsive figure, or deplore our gathering rage."
Bowing low, pale Tacchinardi, long accustomed to such threats.
Burst into a grand bravura, showering notes like diamond jets, —
Sang until the ringing plaudits through the wide Ode'on rang, —
Sang as never soaring tenor ere behind those footlights sang;
And the himchback, ever after, like a god was hailed with cries, —
'' Kiny of minstrels, live forever! Shame on fools loho have but eyes.'^'
Francis Miles Finch.
THE BLUE AND THE GRAY.
By the flow of the inland river;
AVlience the fleets of iron had fled.
Where the blades of the grave-grass
quiver,
Asleep are the ranks of the dead :
Under the sod and the dew;
Waiting the Judgment-Uay;
Under the one, the Blue ;
Under the other, the Gray.
These in the robings of glory.
Those in the gloom of defeat ;
All with the battle-blood- goi-y,
In the dusk of eternity meet;
Under the sod and tlie dew;
Waiting the Judgment-Day;
Under the laurel, the Blue;
Under the willow, the Gray.
From the silence of sorrowful hours
The desolate mourners go,
Lovingly laden with flowers,
Alilce for the friend and the foe;
Under the sod and the dew;
Waiting the Judgment-Day;
Under the laurel, the Blue;
Under the willow, the Gray.
So, with an equal splendor,
The morning sun-rays fall,
With a touch impartially tender.
On the blossoms blooming for all ;
Under the sod and the (lew ;
AVaiting the Judgment-Day ;
Broidered with gold, the Blue;
Mellowed with gold, the Gray.
So. when the smnmer calleth
On forest and field of grain.
With an equal murmiu- falleth
The cooling dri]i of the rain;
Under the sod and the dew;
AVaiting the Judgment-Day;
Wet with the rain, the Blue;
AVet with the rain, the Gray.
228
FRENEAU— GANNETT.
Sadly, but not with upbraiding,
The generous deed was done ;
In the storm of the years, now fad-
ing,
No braver battle was won ;
Under the sod and the dew :
Waiting the Judgment-Day;
Under the blossoms, the Blue,
Under the garlands, the Gray.
No more shall the war-cry sever.
Or the winding rivers be red ;
They banish our anger forever
When they laurel the graves of our
dead.
Under the sod and the dew;
Waiting the Judgment-Day ;
Love and tears for the Blue;
Tears and love for the Gray.
Philip Freneau.
MAY TO APRIL.
Without your showers
1 breed no flowers;
Each field a barren waste appears ;
If you don't weep.
My blossoms sleep.
They take such pleasure in your tears.
As your decay
Made room for May,
So I must part with all that's mine;
My balmy breeze.
My blooming trees.
To torrid zones tlieir sweets resign.
For April dead
My sliades I spread,
To her I owe my dress so gay;
Of daughters three
It falls on me
To close our triumphs in one day.
Thus to repose
All nature goes;
Month after mouth must find its
doom ;
Time on the wing.
May ends the spring.
And summer frolics o'er her tomb.
William Channing Gannett.
LISTENING FOR GOD.
I HEAR it often in the dark,
I hear it in the light, —
Where is the voice that calls to me
With such a quiet might '?
It seems but echo to my thought,
And yet beyond the stars ;
It seems a heart-beat in a hush.
And yet the planet jars.
Oh, may it be that far within
My inmost soul there lies
A spirit-sky, that opens with
Those voices of surprise ?
And can it be, by night and day,
That firmament serene
Is just the heaven where God himself.
The. Father, dwells unseen?
Oh, God within, so close to me
That every thought is plain,
Be judge, be friend, be Father still.
And in thy heaven reign!
Thy heaven is mine, — my very
soul !
Thy words are sweet and strong;
They fill my inward silences
With music and with song.
They send me challenges to right.
And loud rebuke my ill;
They ring my bells of victory.
They breathe my "Peace, be still I"
They ever seem to say, " My child;
Why seek me so all day ?
Now journey inward to thyself,
And listen by the way."
William Lloyd Garrison.
THE FREE MIND.
High walls and huge the body may
confine,
And iron gates obstruct the pi'isoner's
gaze,
And massive bolts may baffle his de-
sign,
And vigilant keepers watch his de-
vious ways ;
But scorns the innnortal" mind such
base control;
No chains can bind it and no cell en-
close.
Swifter than light it flies from pole
to pole.
And in a flash from earth to heaven
it goes.
It leaps from mount to mount, from
vale to vale
It wanders plucking honeyed fruits
and flowers;
It visits home to hear the fireside tale
And in sweet converse jjass the joy-
ous hours ;
'Tis up before the sun, roaming afar,
And in its watches wearies every star.
Frank H. Gassaway.
BAY BILLY.
'TwAS the last fight at Fredericks-
burg, —
Perhaps the day you reck,
Our boys, the Twenty-Second Maine,
Kept Early's men in check.
Just where Wade Hampton boomed
away
The fight went neck and neck.
All day the weaker wing we held.
And held it with a will.
Five several stubborn times we
charged
The battery on the hill,
And five times beaten back, re-formed.
And kept our coliunn still.
At last from out the centre fight.
Spurred up a general's aid.
" That battery must silenced be! "
He cried, as past he sped.
Our colonel simply touched his cap,
And then, with measured tread,
To lead the crouching line once more
The grand old fellow came.
No wounded man l)ut raised his head
And strove to gasp his name.
And those who could not speak nor
stir,
" God blessed him" just the same.
For he was all the world to us,
That hero gray and grim.
Right well we knew that fearful slope
We'd climb with none but him,
Thovigh while his white head led the
way
We'd charge hell's portals in.
This time we were not half-way up.
When, midst the storm of shell,
Our leader, with his sword upraised.
Beneath our bayonets fell.
And, as we bore him back, the foe
Set vip a joyous yell.
Our hearts went with him. Back
we swept.
And when the bugle said
"Up, charge, again!" no man was
there
But hung his dogged head.
"We've no one left to lead us now,"
The sullen soldiers said.
Just then before the laggard line
The colonel's horse we spied,
Bay Billy with his trappings on,
His nostrils swelling wide,
As though still on his gallant back
The master sat astride.
Kight royally he took the place
That was of old his wont,
And with a neigh that seemed to say,
Above the battle's brunt,
" How can the Twenty-Second charge
If I am not in front?"
Like statues rooted there we stood.
And gazed a little space.
Above that floating mane we missed
The dear familiar face,
But we saw Bay Billy's eye of fire,
And it gave us heart of grace.
No bugle-call could rouse us all
As that brave sight had done,
Down all the battered line we felt
A lightning impulse run.
Up! up the hill we followed Bill,
And we captured every gun !
And when upon the conquered height
Died out the battle's hum.
Vainly mid living and the dead
We sought our leader dumb.
It seemed as if a spectre steed
To win that day had come.
And then the dusk and dew of night
Fell softly o'er the plain,
As though o'er man's dread work of
death
The angels wept again.
And drew night's curtain gently
round
A thousand beds of pain.
All night the surgeons' torches went.
The ghastly rows between, —
All night with solenui step I paced
The torn and bloody green.
But who that fought in the big war
Such dread sights have not seen ?
At last the morning broke. The lark
Sang in the merry skies,
As if to e'en the sleepers there
It bade awake, and rise !
Though naught but that last trump
of all
Could ope their heavy eyes.
And then once more with banners
gay.
Stretched out the long brigade.
Trimly upon the furrowed field
The troops stood on parade.
And bravely mid the ranks were
closed
The gaps the fight had made.
Not half the Twenty-Second's men
AVere in their place that morn;
And Corporal Dick, who yester-noon
Stood six brave fellows on.
Now touched my elbow in the ranks,
For all between were gone.
Ah ! who forgets that dreary hour
When, as with misty eyes.
To call the old familiar roll
The solenm sergeant tries, —
One feels that thumping of the heart
As no prompt voice replies.
And as in faltering tone and slow
The last few names were said.
Across the field some missing horse
Toiled up the weary tread,
It caught the sergeant's eye, and
quick
Bay 13illy's name he read.
Yes I there the old bay hero stood,
All safe from battle's harms.
And ere an order could be heard.
Or the bugle's quick alarms.
Down all the front, from end to end.
The troops presented arms !
Not all the shoulder-straps on earth
Could still our nughty cheer;
And ever from that famous day,
AVlien rang the roll call clear.
Bay I5illy's name was read, and
then
The whole line answered, ' ' Here ! "
QILDER
•231
Richard Watson Gilder.
THERE IS NOTHING NEW UNDER
THE SUN.
There is nothing new under the svui ;
There is no new hope or despair;
The agony just begun
Is as old as the earth and the air.
My secret soul of bliss
Is one with the singing star's,
And the ancient mountains miss
No hurt that my being mars.
I know as I know my life,
I know as I know my pain.
That there is no lonely strife,
That he is mad who would gain
A separate balm for his woe,
A single pity and cover:
The one great God I know
Hears the same prayer over and
over.
I know it because at the portal
Of heaven I bowed and cried.
And I said, " Was ever a mortal
Thus crowned and crucified!
Afy praise thou hast made my blame;
My best thou hast made mj worst;
My good thou hast turned to shame ;
My drink is a flaming thirst."
But scarce my prayer was said
Ere from that place I turned ;
I trembled, I hung my head.
My cheek, shame-smitten, burned ;
For there where I bowed down
In my boastful agony,
I thought of thy cross and crown, —
O Christ ! I remembered thee.
THE SOWER.
A SOAVER went forth to sow.
His eyes were dark with woe;
He crushed the flowers beneath his
feet, [sweet.
Nor smelt the perfume warm and
That prayed for pity everywhere.
He came to a field tliat was harried
By iron, and to heaven laid bare:
He shook the seed that he carried
O'er that brown and bladeless ])lace.
He shook it, as (4od shakes hail .
Over a doomed land,
When lightnings interlace
The sky and the earth, and his wand
Of love is a tliunder flail.
Tlius did tliat sower sow;
His seed was human blood,
And tears of \\ om(>n and men.
And I, who near him stood,
Said : When the crop comes, then
There will be sobbing and sighing,
Weeping and wailing and crying.
Flame and ashes and Avoe.
It was an autumn day
When next I Avent that way.
And what, think you. did I see?
AYliat Avas it that I heard ?
The song of a sweet-Aoiced bird ?
Nay — but tlie songs of many.
Thrilled through Avith praise
prayer.
Of all those voices not any
^Vere sad of memoi'y :
And a sea of sunlight flowed,
And a golden harvest glowed !
On my iace I fell down there ;
And I said: Thou only art wise —
God of tlie earth and skies !
And I tliank thee, again and again.
For the sower Avhose name is Pain.
and
WEAL AND WOE.
O HIGHEST, strongest, sweetest wom-
an-soul !
Thou boldest in tlie compass of
thy grace
All the strange fate and passion of
thy race ;
Of the old, primal curse thou
knoAvest the whole :
Tliine eyes, too Avise, are heavy with
the dole.
The doubt, the dread of all this
luunan maze;
232
GILDER.
Thou in the virgin morning of thy
days
Hast felt the bitter waters o'er tliee
roll.
Yet thou knowest, too, the terrible
delight,
The still content, aiid solemn
ecstasy ;
Whatever sharp, sweet bliss thy
kind may know.
Thy spirit is deep for pleasure as for
woe —
Deep as the rich, dark-caverned,
awful sea
That the keen-winded, glimmering
dawn makes white.
TWO LOVE QUATRAINS.
Not from the whole wide world I
choose thee —
Sweetheart, light of the land and
the sea !
The wide, wide world could not en-
close thee.
For thou art the whole wide world
to me.
Yeaks have flown since I knew thee
first.
And I know thee as water is known
of thirst:
Yet I knew thee of old at the first
sweet sight.
And thou art strange to me, love, to-
night.
WHAT WOULD I SAVE THEE
FROM.
What would I save thee from, dear
heart, dear heart ?
Not from what heaven may send
thee of its pain;
Not from fierce sunshine or the
scathing rain:
The pang of pleasure; passion's
wound and smart ;
Not from the scorn and sorrow of
thine art;
Nor loss of faithful friends, nor
any gain
Of growth by grief. I would not
thee restrain
From needful death. But oh, thou
other part
Of me! — through whom the whole
world I behold.
As through the blue I see the stars
above !
In whom the world I find, hid
fold on fold !
Thee would I save from this — nay, do
not move!
Fear not, it may not flash, the air
is cold;
Save thee from this — the lightning
of my love.
/ COUNT MY' TIME BY TIMES
THAT I MEET THEE.
I COUNT my time by times that 1
meet thee;
These are my yesterdays, my mor-
rows, noons.
And nights; these my old moons
and my new moons.
Slow fly the hours, or fast the
hours do flee.
If thou art far from or art near to
me :
If thou art far, the birds' tunes
are no tunes;
If thou art near, the wintry days
are Junes, —
Darkness is light, and soi'row can
not be.
Thou art my dream come true, and
thou ray dream,
The air I breathe, the world where-
in I dwell ;
My journey's end thou art, and
thou the way ;
Thou art what I would be, yet only
seem ;
Thou art my heaven and thou art
my hell ;
Thou art my ever-living judgment-
day.
GILDER.
233
LOVE'S JEALOUSY.
Of other men I know no jealousy,
Nor of the maid who holds thee
close, oh, close:
But of the June-red, summer-
scented rose,
And of the orange-streaked simset
sky
That wins the soul of thee through
thy deep eye ;
And of the breeze by thee beloved,
that goes
O'er thy dear hair and brow; the
song that flows
Into thy heart of hearts, where it
may die.
I would I were one moment that
sweet show
Of flower; or breeze beloved that
toucheth all ;
Or sky that through the summer
eve doth burn.
I would I were the song thou lovestso.
At sound of me to have thine eye-
lid fall:
But I would then to something
human turn.
A THOUGHT.
Once, looking from a window on a
land
That lay in silence underneath the
sun;
A land of broad, green meadows,
through which poured
Two rivers, slowly winding to the
sea, —
Thus, as I looked, I know not how
or whence.
Was borne into my unexpectant soul
That thought, late learned by anx-
ious-witted man.
The infinite patience of the Eternal
Mind.
AND WERE THAT BEST? .
And were that best. Love, dreamless,
endless sleep ?
Gone all the fury of the mortal
day;
The daylight gone, and gone the
starry ray!
And were that best. Love, rest se-
rene and deep ?
Gone labor and desire; no arduous
steep
To climb, no songs to sing, no
prayers to pray.
No help for those who perish by
the way.
No laughter 'midst our tears, no
tears to weep !
And were that best, Love, sleep with
no dear dream,
Nor memory of any thing in life ?
Stark death that neither help nor
hurt can know !
Oh, rather. Love, the sorrow-bring-
ing gleam,
The living day's long agony and
strife !
Katlier strong love in pain, — the
wakinir woe !
THROUGH LOVE TO LIGHT.
Through love to light! Oh, wonder-
ful the way
That leads from darkness to the per-
fect day I
From darkness and from sorrow of
the night
To morning that comes singing o'er
the sea.
Through love to liijht! Through
light, O God, to thee,
Who art the love of love, the eternal
light of light !
234
GOLDSMITH.
Oliver Goldsmith.
[From The Deserted Village.]
THE VILLAGE PREACHER.
Near yonder copse, where once
the garden smiled,
And still where many a garden flower
grows wild.
There, where a few torn shritbs the
place disclose,
The village preacher's modest man-
sion rose.
A man he was to all the country dear.
And passing rich with forty pounds
a year ;
Remote from towns he ran his godly
race,
Nor e'er had changed, nor wished to
change his place;
Unskilful he to fawn, or seek for
power
By doctrines fashioned to the vary-
ing hour;
Far other aims his heart had learned
to prize —
More beht to raise the wretched than
to rise.
His house was known to all the va-
grant train ;
He chid their wanderings, but re-
lieved their pain.
The long-remembered beggar was his
guest.
Whose beard, descending, swept his
aged breast;
The ruined spendthrift, now no
longer proud.
Claimed kindred there, and had his
claims allowed ;
The broken soldier, kindly bade to
stay.
Sate by his fire, and talked the night
away —
Wept o'er his wounds, or, tales of
sorrow done,
Shouldered his crutch, and showed
how fields were won.
Pleased with his guests, the good man
learned to glow,
And quite forgot their vices in their
woe;
Careless their merits or their faults
to scan,
His pity gave, ere charity began.
Thus to relieve the wretched was
his pride.
And e'en his failings leaned to vir-
tue's side;
But in his duty, prompt at every call,
He watched and wept, he prayed and
felt for all ;
And, as a bird each fond endearment
tries
To tempt its new-fledged offspring
to the skies.
He tried each art, reproved each dull
delay.
Allured to brighter worlds, and led
the way.
Beside the bed where parting life
was laid.
And sorrow, guilt, and pain, by turns
dismayed.
The reverend champion stood. At
his control
Despair and anguish fled the strug-
gling soul ;
Comfort came down the trembling
wretch to raise,
And his last faltering accents whis-
pered praise.
At church, with meek and unaf-
fected grace,
His looks adorned the venerable
place ;
Truth from his lips prevailed with
double sway.
And fools, who came to scoff, re-
mained to pray.
The service past, around the pious
man, [ran ;
With ready zeal, each honest rustic
E'en children followed, with endear-
ing wile.
And plucked his gown, to share the
good man's smile.
His ready smile a parent's warmth
exprest ;
GOLDSMITH.
235
Their welfare pleased him, and their
cares distressed ;
To them his heart, his love, his
gi-iefs were given —
But all his serious thoughts had rest
in heaven.
As some tall cliff that lifts its awful
form.
Swells from the vale, and midway
leaves the storm.
Though round its breast the rolling
clouds are spread,
Eternal sunshine settles on its head.
[From The Deserted Village.]
THE VILLAGE SCHOOLMASTER.
Beside yon straggling fence that
skirts the way,
With blossomed furze unprofitably
gay,
There, in his noisy mansion, skilled
to rule.
The village master taught his little
school.
A man severe he was, and stern to
view —
I knew him well, and every truant
knew ;
Well had the boding tremblers learned
to trace
The day's disasters in his morning
face;
Full well they laughed, with coun-
terfeited glee.
At all his jokes, for many a joke had
he;
Full well the busy whisper, circling
round.
Conveyed the dismal tidings when he
frowned ;
Yet he was kind — or, if severe in
aught,
The love he bore to learning was in
fault.
The village all declared how much he
knew ;
'T was certain he could write, and
ciplier too ;
Lands he could measure, terms and
tides presage,
And e'en the story ran that he could
gauge.
In arguing, too, the parson owned
his skill,
For, e'en though vanquished, he
could argue still ;
While words of learned length and
thundering sound
Amazed the gazing rustics ranged
around ;
And still they gazed, and still the
wonder grew.
That one small head could carry all
he knew.
[From The Deserted Village.]
THE HAPPINESS OF PASSING ONE'S
AGE IN FAMILIAR PLACES.
In all my wanderings round this
world of care.
In all my griefs — and God has given
my share —
I still had hopes my latest hours to
crown,
Amidst these humble bowers to lay
me down ;
To husband out life's taper at the
close.
And keep the flame from wasting by
repose ;
I still had hopes — for pride attends
us still —
Amidst the swains to show my book-
learned skill.
Around my fire an evening group to
draw,
And tell of all I felt, and all I saw;
And, as a hare, whom hounds and
horns pursue,
Pants to the place from whence at
first she flew,
I still had hopes, my long vexations
past.
Here to return — and die at home at
last.
O blest retirement! friend to life's
decline !
Retreat from care, that never must
be mine!
236
O OLD SMITH.
How blest is he who crowns, in shades
like these,
A youth of labor, with an age of ease;
Who quits a world where strong temp-
tations try,
And, since 't is hard to combat, learns
to fly!
For him no wretches, born to work
and weep,
Explore the mine, or tempt the dan-
gerous deep ;
No surly porter stands in guilty state,
To spurn imploring famine from the
gate;
But on he moves to meet his latter
end,
Angels around befriending virtue's
friend ;
Sinks to the grave with unperceived
decay.
While resignation gently slopes the
way ;
And, all his prospects brightening to
the last,
His heaven commences, ere the world
be past.
{From The Traveller.]
FRANCE.
Gay sprightly land of mirth and
social ease.
Pleased with thyself, whom all the
world can please.
How often have I led thy sportive
choir.
With tuneless pipe, beside the mur-
muring Loire !
Where shading elms along the mar-
gin grew.
And freshened from the wave the
zephyr flew;
And haply, though my harsh touch,
faltering still.
But mocked all tune, and marred the
dancer's skill.
Yet would the village praise my won-
drous power,
And dance, forgetful of the noontide
hour.
Alike all ages : dames of ancient
days
Have led their children through the
mirthful maze.
And the gay grandsire, skilled in
gestic lore,
Has frisked beneath the burden of
threescore.
Jio blest a life these thoughtless
realms display,
Thus idly busy rolls their world away:
Tlieirs are those arts that mind to
mind endear,
For honor forms the social temper
here:
Honor, that praise which real merit
gains
Or e'en imaginary worth obtains.
Here passes current ; paid from hand
to hand.
It shifts in splendid traffic round the
land :
From coui-ts, to camps, to cottages it
strays,
And all are taught an avarice of
praise;
They please, are pleased, they give
to get esteem.
Till, seeming blest, they grow to
what they seem.
But while this softer art their bliss
supplies,
It gives their follies also room to rise;
For praise too dearly loved, or warm-
ly sought,
Enfeebles all internal strength of
thought ;
And the weak soul, within itself un-
blest.
Leans for all pleasure on another's
breast.
Hence Ostentation here, with tawdry
art.
Pants for the vulgar praise which
fools impart; [ace,
Here Vanity assumes her pert grim-
And trims her robe of frieze with
copper lace ;
Here beggar Pride defrauds her daily
cheer,
To boast one splendid banquet once
a year;
The mind still turns where shifting
fashion draws
Nor weighs the solid worth of self-
applause.
GOODALE.
[From The Oratorio of the Captivity.]
HOPE.
The wretch condemned with hfe to
part,
Still, still on hope relies;
And every pang that rends the heart,
Bids expectation rise.
Hope, like the glimmering taper's
light,
Adorns and cheers the way.
And still, as darker grows the night,
Emits a brighter tUiy.
[From the Oratorio of the Captiriti/.]
THE PROPHETS' SOXG.
Our God is all we boast below.
To Him we turn our eyes;
And every added weight of woe,
Shall make our homage rise.
And though no temple richly dressed,
Nor sacrifice is here;
We'll make His temple in our breast.
And offer up a tear.
[From The Oratorio of the Captivity.']
MEMOn Y.
O Memohy! thou fond deceiver,
Still importunate and vain.
To former joys recurring ever.
And turning all the past to pain !
Then, like the world, the oppressed
oppressing,
Thy smiles increase the wretch's
woe ;
And he who wants each otiier bless-
ing.
In thee must ever find a foe.
Dora Read Goodale.
PilPE GRArX.
O STILL, white face of perfect
peace,
Untouched by passion, freed from
pain, —
He who ordained that work should
cease,
Took to Himself the ripened grain.
O noble face ! your beauty bears
The glory that is wrung from pain,
The high celestial beauty wears
Of finished work, of ripened grain.
Of human care you left no trace.
No lightest trace of grief or pain, —
On earth an empty form and face —
In Heaven stands the ripened grain.
Elaine Goodale.
ASHES OF ROSES.
Soft on the sunset sky
Bright daylight closes,
Leaving, when light doth die.
Pale hues that mingling lie, —
Ashes of roses.
When Love's warm sun is set,
Love's brightness closes;
Eyes with hot tears are wet.
In hearts then linger yet
Ashes of roses.
Hannah Flagg Gould.
THE SOUL'S FAREWELL.
It must be so, poor, fading, mortal
thing!
And now we part, thou i^allid form
of clay I
Thy hold is broken — I unfurl my
wing;
And from the dust the spirit must
away !
As thou at night, hast thrown thy
vesture by,
Tired with the day, to seek thy
wonted rest,
Fatigued with time's vain round, 'tis
thus that I
Of thee, frail covering, myself di-
vest.
Thou knowest, while journeying in
this thorny road,
How oft we've sighed and strug-
gled to be twain ;
How I have longed to drop my earth-
ly load,
And thou, to rest thee from thy
toil and pain.
Then he, who severs our mysterious
tie.
Is a kind angel, granting each re-
lease ;
He'll seal thy quivering lip and
sunken eye.
And stamp thy brow with ever-
lasting peace.
When thou hast lost the beauty that I
gave.
And life's gay scenes no more will
give thee place,
Thou may'st retire within the secret
grave.
Where none shall look upon thine
altered face.
But I am summoned to the eternal
throne.
To meet the presence of the King
most high;
I go to stand unshrouded and alone,
Full in the light of God's all-search-
ing eye.
There must the deeds which we to-
gether wrought,
Be all remembered — each a wit-
ness made ;
The outward action and the secret
thought
Before the silent soul must there
be weighed.
Lo! I behold the seraph throng de-
scend
To waft me up where love and
mercy dw.ell;
Away, vain fears ! the Judge will be
my friend ;
It is my Father calls — pale clay,
farewell !
A NAME IN THE SAND.
Alone I walked the ocean strand;
A pearly shell was in my hand :
I stooped and wrote upon the sand
My name — the year — the day.
As onward from the spot I passed,
One lingering look behind 1 cast:
A wave came rolling high and fast,
And washed my lines away.
And so, nietliought, 'twill shortly be
With every mark on earth trom me:
A wave of dark oblivion's sea
Will sweep across the place
Where I have trod the sandy shore
Of time, and been to be no more.
Of me — my day — the name I bore.
To leave nor track nor trace.
And yet, with Him wiio counts the
sands,
And holds the waters in his hands,
I know a lasting record stands.
Inscribed against my name,
Of all this mortal part has wrought;
Of all this thinking soul has thought;
And from these fleeting moments
caught
For glory or for shame.
James Grahame.
IFrom The Sabbath.]
SABBATH MORNING.
How still the morning of the hal-
lowed day!
Mute is the voice of rural labor,
hushed
The ploughboy's whistle and the
milkmaid's song.
The scythe lies glittering in the dewy
wreath
Of tedded grass, mingled with fading
flowers,
That yester-morn bloomed waving
in the breeze.
Sounds the most faint attract the
ear, — the hum
Of early bee, the trickling of the
dew,
The distant bleating midway up the
hill.
Calmness seems throned on yon un-
moving cloud.
To him who wanders o'er the upland
leas,
The blackbird's note comes mellower
from the dale ;
And sweeter from the sky the glad-
some lark
Warbles his heaven-tuned song; the
lulling brook
Murmurs more gently down the
deep-sunk glen;
While from yon lowly roof, whose
curling smoke
O'ermounts the mist, is heard at in-
tervals
The voice of psalms, the simple song
of praise.
With dove-like wings Peace o'er
yon village broods :
The dizzying mill-wheel rests; the
anvil's din
Hath ceased ; all, all around is quiet-
ness.
Less fearful on this day, the limping
hare
Stops, and looks back, and stops, and
looks on man.
Her deadliest foe. The toil-worn
horse, set free,
Unheedful of the pasture, roams at
large ;
And, as his stiff unwieldy bulk he
rolls.
His iron-armed hoofs gleam in the
morning ray.
But chiefly man the day of rest
enjoys.
Hail, Sabbath! thee I hail, the poor
man's day.
On other days, the man of toil is
doomed
To eat his joyless bread, lonely, the
ground
Both seat and board, screened from
the winter's cold
And summer's heat by neighboring
hedge or tree;
But on this day, embosomed in his
home.
He shares the frugal meal with those
he loves;
With those he loves he shares the
heartfelt joy
Of giving thanks to God, — not
thanks of form,
A word and a grimace, but reverently,
With covered face and upward ear-
nest eye.
Hail, Sabbath ! thee I hail, the poor
man's day:
The pale mechanic now has leave to
breathe
The morning air, pure from the city's
smoke ;
While wandering slowly up the river-
side.
He meditates on Him whose power
he niarks
In each green tree that proudly
spreads the bough,
As in the tiny dew-bent flowers that
bloom
Around the roots.
240
GRAY.
Elinor Gray.
ISOLATION.
We walk alone through all life's va-
rious ways,
Through light and darkness, sorrow,
joy, and change;
And greeting each to each, through
passing days,
Still we are strange.
We hold our dear ones with a firm,
strong grasp ;
We hear their voices, look into their
eyes;
And yet, betwixt us in that clinging
clasp
A distance lies.
We cannot know their hearts, how-
e'er we may
Mingle thought, aspiration, hope and
prayer;
We cannot reach them, and in vain
essay
To enter there.
Still, in each heart of hearts a hid-
den deep
Lies, never fathomed by its dearest,
best.
With closest care our purest thoughts
we keep.
And tenderest.
But, blessed thought! we shall not
always so
In darkness and in sadness walk
alone;
There comes a glorious day when we
shall know
As we are known.
Thomas Gray.
ELEGY l2\ A COUNTRY CHURCH-
YARD.
TuE curfew tolls the knell of parting
day,
The lowing herd winds slowly o'er
the lea,
The ploughman homeward plods his
weaiy way,
And leaves the world to darkness
and to me.
Now fades the glimmering landscape
on the sight.
And all the air a solemn stillness
holds,
Save where the beetle wheels his
droning flight,
And drowsy tinklings lull the distant
folds :
Save that from yonder ivy-mantled
tower,
The moping owl does to the moon
complain
Of such as, wandering near her secret
bower,
Molest her ancient solitary reign.
Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-
tree's shade,
Where heaves the turf in many a
mouldering heap.
Each in his narrow cell for ever laid,
The rude forefathers of the hamlet
sleep.
The breezy call of incense-breathing
morn,
The swallow twittering from the
straw-built shed.
GRAY.
241
The cock's shrill clarion, or the echo-
ing horn,
No more shall rouse them from their
lowly bed.
For them no more the blazing hearth
shall burn, [care :
Or busy housewife ply her evening
No children run to lisp their sire's
return.
Or climb his knees the envied kiss to
share.
Oft did the harvest to their sickle
yield,
Their furroAV oft the stubborn glebe
has broke ;
How jocund did they drive their team
afield!
How bowed the woods beneath their
sturdy stroke !
Let not Ambition mock their useful
toil,
Their homely joys, and destiny ob-
scure! [smile
Nor Grandeur hear with a disdainful
The short and simple annals of the
poor.
The boast of heraldry, the pomp of
power.
And all that beauty, all that wealth
e'er gave.
Await alike the inevitable hour, —
The paths of glory lead but to the
grave.
Nor you, ye proud, impute to these
the fault.
If memory o'er their tomb no trophies
raise.
Where through the long-drawn aisle
and fretted vault
The pealing anthem swells the note
of praise.
Can storied lu-n or animated bust.
Back to its mansion call the fleeting
breath ?
Can Honor's voice provoke the silent
dust,
Or Flattei y soothe the dull cold ear of
death ?
Perhaps in this neglected spot is laid
Some heart once pregnant with celes-
tial fire;
Hands, that the rod of empire might
have swayed.
Or waked to ecstasy the living lyre:
But knowledge to their eyes her am-
ple page
Rich with the spoils of time, did ne'er
unroll;
Chill penury repressed their noble
rage.
And froze the genial current of the
soul.
Full many a gem of purest ray serene
The dark unfathomed caves of ocean
bear:
Full many a flower is born to blush
unseen.
And waste its sweetness on the desert
air.
Some village Hampden, that with
dauntless breast.
The little tyrant of his fields with-
stood ;
Some mute inglorious Milton here
may rest.
Some Cromwell, guiltless of his coun-
try's blood.
The applause of list'ning senates to
command.
The threats of pain and ruin to de-
spise.
To scatter plenty o'er a smiling land.
And read tlieir history in a nation's
eyes,
Their lot forbade : nor circumscribed
alone
Their growing virtues, but their
crimes confined;
Forbade to wade through slaughter
to a throne.
And shut the gates of mercy on man-
kind;
The struggling pangs of conscious
truth to hide,
To quench the blushes of ingenuous
shame,
242
GRAY.
Or heap the shrine of luxury and
pride
With incense kindled at the Muse's
flame.
Far from the madding crowd's igno-
ble strife
Their sober wishes never learned to
stray ;
Along the cool, sequestei'ed vale of
life
They kept the noiseless tenor of their
way.
Yet e'en these bones from insult to
protect
Some frail memorial still erected
nigh,
With uncouth rhymes and shapeless
sculpture decked.
Implores the passing tribute of a sigh.
Their name, their years, spelt by the
unlettered Muse,
The jalace of fame and elegy supply:
And many a holy text around she
strews,
That teach the rustic moralist to die.
For who, to dumb forgetfulness a
prey,
This pleasing anxious being e'er re-
signed.
Left the warm precincts of the cheer-
ful day,
Nor cast one longing, lingering look
behind ?
On some fond breast the parting soul
relies;
Some pious drops the closing eye re-
quires;
E'en from the tomb the voice of
Nature cries.
E'en in our ashes live their wonted
fires.
For thee, who, mindful of the un-
honored dead,
Dost in these lines their artless tale
relate; [led.
If chance, by lonely contemplation
.Some kindred spirit shall inquire thy
fate, —
Haply some hoary-headed swain may
say.
Oft have we seen him at the peep of
dawn.
Brushing with hasty steps the dews
away,
To meet the sun upon the upland
lawn;
There at the foot of yonder nodding
beech
That wreathes its old fantastic roots
so high,
His listless length at noon-tide would
he stretch.
And pore upon the brook that bab-
bles by.
Hard by yon wood, now smiling as
in scorn.
Muttering his wayward fancies he
would rove;
NoAV drooping, woful-wan, like one
forlorn.
Or crazed with care, or crossed in
hoi)eless love.
One morn 1 missed him on the 'cus-
tomed hill,
Along the heath, and near his favor-
ite tree;
Another came; nor yet beside the
rill.
Nor up the lawn, nor at the wood
was he;
The next Avith dirges due in sad array
Slow through the church-Avay jjath
we saw him borne, —
Approach and read (for thou canst
read) the lay
Graved on the stone beneath yon
aged thorn.
THE EPITAPH,
Here rests his head upon the lap of
earth
A youth, to for time and to fame un-
known ;
Fair Science f roAvned not on his hum-
ble birth.
And Melancholy marked him for her
own.
GRAY.
243
Large was his bounty, and bis soul
sincere ;
Heaven did a recompense as largely
send :
He gave to inlsery all he had, a tear,
He gained from Heaven, 't was all he
wished, a friend.
No farther seek his merits to disclose,
Or draw his frailties from their
dread abode,
(There they alike in trembling hope
repose, )
The bosom of his Father and his God.
ODE ON THE SPRING.
Lo ! where the rosy-bosomed hours
Fair Venus' train, appear,
Disclose the long-expecting flowers
And wake the purple year!
The Attic warbler pours her throat
Responsive to the cuckoo's note,
Tbe untaught harmony of spring:
While, whispering pleasure as they tly,
Cool zephyrs through the clear blue
sky'
Their gathered fragrance fling.
Where'er the oak's thick branches
stretch
A broader, browner shade,
Where'er the rude and moss-grown
beech
O'er canopies the glade.
Beside some water's rushy brink
With me the Muse shall sit, and
think
(At ease reclined in rustic state)
How vain the ardor of the crowd.
How low, how little are the proud.
How indigent the great ;
Still is the toiling hand of Care;
The panting herds repose:
Yet hark, how thro' the peopled air
The busy murmur glows :
The insect youth are on the wing,
Eager to taste the honeyed spring
And float amid the liquid noon :
Some lightly o'er the current skim.
Some show their gaily-gilded trim
Quick-glancing to the sun.
To Contemplation's sober eye
Such is the race of man :
And they that creep, and they that fly
Shall end where they began.
Alike the busy and the gay
But flutter thro' life's little day.
In fortune's varying colors drest:
Brushed by the hand of rough mis-
chance
Or chilled by age, their airy dance
They leave, in dust to rest.
Methinks I hear in accents low
The sportive kind reply:
Poor moralist! and what art thou ?
A solitary fly 1
Thy joys no glittering female meets.
No hive hast thou of hoarded sweets.
No painted plumage to display:
On hasty wings thy youth is flown ;
Thy sun is set, thy spring is gone, —
We frolic while 'tis May.
THE PLEASURE ARISING FROM
VICISSITUDE.
Smiles on past Misfortune's brow
Soft Reflection's hand can trace.
And o'er the cheek of Sorrow throw
A melancholy grace;
While hope prolongs our happier
hour.
Or deepest shades, that dimly lower
And blacken round our weary way.
Gilds with a gleam of distant day.
Still, where rosy Pleasure leads.
See a kindred Grief pursue ;
Behind the steps that Misery treads
Approaching Comfort view:
The hues of bliss more brightly glow
Chastised by sabler tints of woe.
And blended form, with artful strife,
The strength and harmony of life.
See the wretch that long has tost
On the thorny bed of pain.
At length repair his vigor lost
And breathe and walk again:
The meanest floweret of the vale.
The simplest note that swells the gale,
The common sun, the air, the skies.
To him are opening Paradise.
244
ORA i:
ODE ON A DISTANT PROSPECT OF
ETON.
Yk distant spires, ye antique towers,
Tliat crown the wat'ry glade,
Where grateful Science still adores
Her Henry's holy shade!
And ye, that from the stately brow
Of Windsor's heights the expanse
below
Of grove, of lawn, of mead survey.
Whose turf, whose shade, whose
flowers among
AVanders the hoary Thames along
His silver winding way.
Ah, happy hills! ah, pleasing shade!
Ah, fields beloved in vain!
Where once my careless childhood
strayed,
A stranger yet to pain !
I feel the gales, that from ye blow,
A momentary bliss bestow,
As waving fresh their gladsome
wing.
My weary soul they seem to sooth,
And, redolent of joy and youth,
To breathe a second spring.
Say, Father Tliames (for thou hast
seen
Full many a sprightly race.
Disporting on thy margent green.
The paths of pleasure trace),
Who foremost now delight to cleave
With pliant arm thy glassy wave ?
The captive linnet which enthral ?
What idle progeny succeed
To chase the rolling circle's speed.
Or urge the flying ball ?
While some, on earnest business bent,
Their murm'ring labors ply
'Gainst graver hours, that bring con-
straint
To sweeten liberty :
Some bold adventurers disdain
The limits of their little reign,
And unknown regions dare de-
scry,
Still as they run they look behind.
They hear a voice in every wind.
And snatch a fearful joy.
Gay hope is theirs by fancy fed,
Less pleasing when possest;
The tear forgot as soon as shed,
The sunshine of the breast:
Theirs buxom health, of rosy hue,
Wild wit, invention ever new.
And lively cheer, of vigor born;
The thoughtless day, the easy night.
The spirits pure, the slumbeis light
That fly the approach of morn.
Alas! regardless of their doom
The little victims play!
No sense have they of ills to come.
Nor care beyond to-day :
Yet see how all around them wait
The ministers of human fate
And black misfortune's baleful
train !
Ah, show them where in ambush
stand.
To seize their prey, the murderous
band !
Ah, tell them they are men!
These shall the fury passions tear.
The vultures of the mind.
Disdainful anger, pallid fear.
And shame that skulks behind;
Or pining love shall waste their
youth.
Or jealousy with rankling tooth
That inly gnaws the secret heart.
And envy wan, and faded care,
Grim-visaged comfortless despair,
And sorrow's piercing dart.
Ambition this shall temi)t to rise,
Tlien whirl the wretch from high
To bitter scorn a sacrifice
And grinning infamy.
The stings of "falsehood those shall
try.
And hard unkindness' altered eye.
That mocks the tear it forced to
flow;
And keen remorse with blood defiled.
And moody madness laughing wild
Amid severest woe.
Lo, in the Vale of Years beneath
A grisly troop are seen.
The painful family of Death,
More hideous than their queen:
aUSTAFSON.
245
This racks the joints, this fires the
veins,
That every laboring sinew strains,
Those in the deeper vitals rage:
Lo, poverty, to fill the band,
That numbs the soul v/ith icy hand,
And slow-consuming age.
To each his sufferings: all are men.
Condemned alike to groan ;
The tender for another's pain,
The imfeeling for his own.
Yet, ah ! why should they know their
fate,
Since sorrow never comes too late.
And happiness too swiftly flies ?
Thought would destroy their para-
disc !
No more, — where ignorance is bliss,
'Tis folly to be wise.
Zadel Barnes Gustafson.
LITTLE MARTIN CRAG HAN.
One reads tome Macaulay's "Lays"
With fervid voice, intoning well
The poet's fire, the vocal grace;
They hold me like a spell.
'Twere marvel if in human veins
Could beat a pulse so cold
It would not quicken to the strains,
The flying, fiery strains, that tell
How Rojiians "kept the bridge so
Avell
In the brave days of old."
The while I listened, till my blood.
Plunged in the poet's martial mood,
Rushed in my veins like wine,
1 prayed, — to One who hears, I wis;
"Give me one breath of power like
this
To sing of rittston mine! "
A child looks up the ragged shaft,
A boy whose meagre frame
Shrinks as he hears the roaring
draught
That feeds the eager flame.
He has a single chance; the stakes
Of life show death at bay
One moment ; then his comrade takes
The hope he casts away.
For while his trembling hand is raised.
And while his sweet eyes shine,
There swells above the love of life
The rush of love divine, —
The thought of those unwarned, to
whom
Death steals along the mine.
little Martin Craghan !
I reck not if you swore,
Ijike Porsena of ( 'lusium.
By gods of mythic lore ;
But w^ell I ween as great a heart
Beat your small bosom sore.
And that your bare brown feet scarce
felt
The way they bounded o'er.
1 know you were a hero then,
Whate'er you were before;
And in God's sight your flying feet
Made white the cavern floor.
The while he speeds that darksome
way,
Hope paints upon his fears
Soft visions of the light of day;
Faint songs of birds he hears;
In summer breeze his tangled curls
Are blown about his ears.
He sees the men ; he warns ; and now.
His duty bravely done,
Sweet hope may paint the fairest
scene
That spreads beneath the sun.
Back to the burning shaft he flies;
There bounding pulses fail ;
The light forsakes his lifted eyes;
The glowing cheek is pale.
246
GUSTAFSON.
With wheeling, whirHng, hungry
flame,
The seething shaft is rife:
Where sohd chains drip liquid fire,
What chance for human life ?
To die with tliose he hoped to save.
Back, back, through heat and
gloom.
To find a wall, — and Death and he
Shut in the larger tomb I
He pleaded to be taken in
As closer rolled the smoke;
In deathful vapors they could hear
His piteous accents choke.
And they, with shaking voice, re-
fused ;
And then the young heart broke. .
Oh love of life! God made it strong,
And knows how close it pressed;
And death to those who love life
least
Is scarce a welcome guest.
One thought of the poor wife, whose
head
Last night lay on his breast:
A quiver runs through lii^s that morn
By children's lips caressed.
These things the sweet strong
thoughts of home, —
Though but a wretched place.
To which the sad-eyed miners come
AVith Labor's laggard pace, —
Remembered in the cavern gloom.
Illume the haggard face, —
Ilhmied their faces, steeled each
heart.
O God ! what mysteries
Of brave and base make sum and part
Of human histories !
What will not thy poor creatures do
To buy an hour of breath I
Well for us all some souls are true
Above the fear of death !
He wept a little,— for they heard
The sound of sobs, the sighs
That breathed of martyrdom complete
Unseen of mortal eyes, —
And then, no longer swift, his feet
Passed down the galleries.
He crept and crouched beside his
nude.
Led by its dying moan;
He touched it feebly with a hand
That shook like palsy's own.
God grant the touch had power to
make
The child feel less alone !
Who knoweth every heart. He knows
What moved the boyish mind;
What longings grew to passion-throes
For dear ones left behind ;
How hardly youth and youth's de-
sires
Their hold of life resigned.
Perhaps the little fellow felt
As brave Horatius thought,
When for those dearer lioman lives
He held his own as nought.
For how could boy die better
Than facing fearful fires
To save poor women's husbands
And helpless children's sires ?
Death leaned upon him heavily;
But Love, more mighty still. —
She lent him slender lease of life
To work her tender will.
He felt with sightless, sentient hand
Along the wall and ground,
And there the rude and simple page
For his sweet piu'pose found.
O'erwritten with the names he loved.
Clasped to his little side.
Dim eyes the wooden record read
Hours after he had died.
Thus from all knowledge of his kind.
In darkness lone and vast.
From life to death, from death to life.
The little hero passed.
And, while they listened for the feet
That would return no more.
Far off they fell in music sweet
Upon another shore.
Samuel Miller Hageman.
ONL Y.
Only a little child,
Crushed to death to-day in the mart ;
But the whole unhorizoned kingdom
of heaven
Was in that little heart.
Only a grain of sand,
ISwirled up where the sea lies spent ;
But it holds wherever it be in space
The poise of a continent.
Only a minute gone.
That to think of now is vain ;
Ah! that was the minute without
whose link
Had dropped Eternity's chain.
THE TWO GREAT CITIES.
Side by side rise the two great cities.
Afar on the traveller's sight;
One, black with the dust of lalsor.
One, solemnly still and white.
Apart, and yet together.
They are reached in a dying breath,
But a river flows between them,
And the river's name is — Death
Apart, and yet together.
Together, and yet apart.
As the child may die at midnight
On the mother's living heart.
So close come the two great cities.
With only the river between ;
And the grass in the one is trami^led,
But the grass in the other is green.
The hills with uncovered foreheads.
Like the disciples meet.
While ever the flowing water
Is washing their hallowed feet.
And out on the glassy ocean,
The sails in the golden gloom
Seem to me but moving shadows
Of the white emmarbled tomb.
Anon, from the hut and the palace
Anon, from early till late,
They come, rich and jjoor together.
Asking alms at thy beautiful gate.
And never had life a guerdon
* So welcome to all to give.
In the land where the living are dy-
ing.
As the land where the dead may
live.
O silent city of refuge
On the way to the city o'erhead!
The gleam of thy marble milestones
Tells the distance we are from the
dead.
Full of feet, but a city untrodden,
Full of hands, but a city vmbidlt.
Full of strangers who know not even
That theirlife-cup lies there spilt.
They know not the tomb from the
palace.
They dream not they ever have
died :
God be thanked they never will know
it
Till they live on the other side !
From the doors that death shut coldly
On the face of their last lone woe :
They came to thy glades for shelter
Who had nowhere else to go.
248
HALLECK.
Fitz-Greene Halleck.
MARCO BOZZARIS.
At midnight in his guarded tent,
The Turk was dreaming of the
horn-
When Greece, her linee in suppliance
bent,
Should tremble at his power :
In dreams, through camp and court
he bore
The trophies of a conqueror;
In dreams his song of triumph
heard ;
Then wore his monarch's signet ring:
Then pressed that monarch's throne
— a king ;
As wild his thoughts, and gay of
wing.
As Eden's garden bird.
At midnight, in the forest shades,
Bozzaris ranged his Suliote band.
True as the steel of their tried blades,
Heroes in heart and hand.
There had the Persian's thousands
stood.
There had the glad earth drunk their
blood
On old Platasa's day;
And now there breathed that haunted
air
The sons of sires who conquered
there.
With arm to strike, and soul to dare,
As quick, as far as they.
An hour passed on — the Turk
awoke;
That bright dream was his last;
He woke to hear his sentries shriek,
" To arms! they come! the Greek!
the Greek!"
He woke — to die midst flame and
smoke,
And shout, and groan, and sabre-
stroke.
And death-shots falling thick and
fast
As lightnings from the mountain-
cloud ;
And heard, with voice as trumpet
loud,
Bozzaris cheer his band.
" Strike — till the last armed foe ex-
pires ;
Strike — for your altars and your
fires;
Strike — for the green graves of your
sires :
God, and your native land! "
They fought, — like brave men, long
and well;
They piled that ground with Mos-
lem slain ;
They conquered — but Bozzaris fell,
Bleeding at every vein.
His few surviving comrades saw
His smile when rang their prouil hur-
rah.
And the red field was Avon :
Then saw in death his eyelids close
Calmly, as to a night's repose.
Like flowers at set of sun.
Come to the bridal chamber. Death!
Come to the mother's, when she
feels.
For the first time, her first-born's
breath ;
Come when the blessed seals
That close the pestilence are broke.
And crowded cities wail its stroke ;
Come in Consumption's ghastly
form,
The earthquake shock, the ocean
storm ;
Come when the heart beats high and
warm.
With banquet-song, and dance,
and wine;
And thou art terrible — the tear,
The groan, the knell, the pall, the
bier.
And all we know, or dream, or fear,
Of agony, are thine.
But to the hero, when his sword
Has won the battle for the free.
HALLECK.
249
Thy voice sounds like a prophet's
word ;
And in its hollow tones are heard
The thanks of millions yet to be.
Come, when his task of fame is
wrought —
Come with her laurel-leaf, blood-
bought —
Come in her crowning hour — and
then
Thy sunken eye's unearthly light
To him is welcome as the sight
Of sky and stars to prisoned men ;
Thy grasp is welcome as the hand
Of brother in a foreign land ;
Thy summons welcome as the cry
That told the Indian isles were nigh
To the world-seeking Genoese,
When the land-wind, from woods of
palm.
And orange-groves, and fields of balm,
Blew o'er the Haytien seas.
Bozzaris ! with the storied brave,
Greece nurtured in her glory's time,
Rest thee — there is no prouder grave.
Even in her own proud clime.
She wore no funeral weeds for thee,
Nor bade the dark hearse wave its
plume.
Like torn branch from death's leaf-
less tree.
In sorrow's pomp and pageantry.
The heartless luxury of the tomb :
But she remembers thee as one
Long loved and for a season gone.
For thee her poets' lyre is wreathed.
Her marble wrought, her music
breathed :
For thee she rings the birthday bells ;
Of thee her babes' first lisping tells :
For thine her evening prayer is said
At palace couch, and cottage bed;
Her soldier, closing with the foe.
Gives for thy sake a deadlier blow;
His plighted maiden, when she fears
For him, the joy of her young years.
Thinks of thy fate, and checks her
tears.
And she, the mother of thy boys,
Though in her eye and faded cheek
Is read the grief she will not speak,
The memory of her buried joys.
And even she who gave thee birth,
Will, by their pilgrim-circled hearth,
Talk of thy doom without a sigh :
For thou art Freedom's now, ami
Fame's,
One of the few, the immortal names
That were not born to die.
B URNS.
W11.D rose of Alloway! my thanks;
Thou mind'st me of that autumn
noon
When first we met upon " the banks
And bi-aes o' bonny Doon."
Like thine, beneath the thorn-tree's
bough.
My sunny hour was glad and brief
We've crossed the winter sea, and
thou
Art withered — flower and leaf.
And will not thy death-doom l)e
mine —
The doom of all things wrought of
clay ?
And withered my life's leaf like
thine.
Wild rose of Alloway ?
Not so his memory for whose sake
My bosom bore thee far and long.
His, who a humbler flower could
make
Immortal as his song.
The memory of Bums — a name
That calls, when brimmed her fes-
tal cup,
A nation's glory and her shame.
In silent sadness up.
A nation's glory — be the rest
Forgot — she's canonized his mind,
And it is joy to speak the best
We may of humankind.
I've stood beside the cottage-bed
Where the bard-peasant first drew
breath :
250
HALLECK.
A straw-thatched roof above his
head,
A straw-wrought couch beneath.
And I have stood beside the pile,
His monument — that tells to heaven
The homage of earth's proudest isle
To that bard-peasant given.
Bid thy thoughts hover o'er that
spot.
Boy-minstrel, in thy dreaming
hour;
And know, however low his lot,
A poet's pride and power;
The pride that lifted Burns from
earth.
The power that gave a child of
song
Ascendency o'er rank and birth,
The rich, the brave, the strong;
And if despondency weigh down
Thy spirit's fluttering pinions then,
Despair — thy name is written on
Tlie roll of common men.
There have been loftier themes than
his.
And longer scrolls, and louder lyres.
And lays lit up Avith Poesy's
Purer and holier fires;
Yet read the names that know not
death ;
Few nobler ones than Burns are
there ;
And few have won a greener wreath
Than that which binds his hair.
His is that language of the heart
In which the answering heart would
speak.
Thought, word, that bids the warm
tear start.
Or the smile light the cheek ;
And his that music to whose tone
The common pulse of man keeps
time.
In cot or castle's mirth or moan.
In cold or sunny clime.
And who hath heard his song, nor
knelt
Before its spell with willing knee,
And listened, and believed, and felt
The poet's mastery
O'er the mind's sea, in calm and
storm.
O'er the heart's sunshine and its
showers.
O'er Passion's moments, bright and
warm,
O'er Reason's dark, cold hours;
On fields where brave men "die or
do,"
In halls where rings the banquet's
mirth,
Where mourners weep, where lovers
woo,
From throne to cottage hearth ?
What sweet tears dim the eye unshed.
What wild vows falter on the
tongue.
When "(Scots wha hae wi' AVallace
bled,"
Or " Auld Lang Syne," is sung!
Pure hopes, that lift the soul above.
Come with his Cotter's hymn of
praise,
And dreams of youth, and truth, and
love
With "Logan's" banks and braes.
And when he breathes his master-lay
Of Alloway's witch-haunted wall,
All passions in our frames of clay
Come thronging at his call.
Imagination's world of air.
And our own world, its gloom and
glee.
Wit, pathos, poetry, are there.
And death's sublimity.
And Burns, though brief the race he
ran.
Though rough and dark the path
he trod —
Lived, died, in form and soul a man,
The image of his God.
HALLECK.
251
Tlirough care, and pain, and want,
and woe,
With woimds that only death could
heal.
Tortures the poor alone can know.
The proud alone can feel ;
He kept his honesty and truth,
His independent tongue and pen.
And moved, in manhood as in youth.
Pride of his fellow-men.
Strong sense, deep feeling, passions
strong,
A hate of tyrant and of knave,
A love of right, a scorn of wrong.
Of coward and of slave ;
A kind, true heart, a spirit high.
That could not fear and would not
AVere written in his manly eye
And on his manly brow.
Piaise to the bard! his words are
driven,
Like flower-seeds by the far winds
sown,
Where'er, beneath the sky of heaven,
The birds of fame have flown.
Praise to the man ! a nation stood
Beside his coffin with wet eyes,
Her brave, her beautiful, her good.
As when a loved one dies.
And still, as on his funeral-day.
Men stand his cold earth-couch
around,
With the mute homage that we pay
To consecrated ground.
And consecrated ground it is,
The last, the hallowed home of
one
Who lives upon all memories,
Though with the buried gone.
Such graves as his are pilgrim-shrines.
Shrines to no code or creed con-
fined —
The Delphian vales, the Palestines,
The Meccas of the mind.
Sages, with Wisdom's garland
wreathed.
Crowned kings, and mitred priests
of power.
And warriors with their bright swords
sheathed.
The mightiest of the hour.
And lowlier names, whose humble
home
Is lit by fortune's dimmer star.
Are there — o'er wave and mountain
come.
From coiuitries near and far ;
Pilgrims, whose wandering feet have
pressed [sand.
The Switzer's snow, the Arab's
Or trod the piled leaves of the west,
My own green forest land.
All ask the cottage of his birth.
Gaze on the scenes he loved and
sung.
And gather feelings not of earth
His field and streams among.
They linger by the Doon's low trees.
And pastoral Nith, and wooded
Ayr,
And round thy sepulchres, Dum-
fries !
The Poet's tomb is there.
But what to them the sculptor's art.
His funeral columns, wreaths, and
urns ?
Wear they not graven on the heart
The name of Robert Burns ?
ON
THE DEATH OF JOSEPH ROD-
MAN DRAKE.
Green be the turf above thee,
Friend of my better days!
None knew thee but to love thee,
Nor named thee but to praise.
Tears fell, when thou wert dying.
From eyes unused to weep.
And long where thou art lying,
Will tears the cold turf steep.
^
^ii^'
252
HARTE.
When hearts, whose truth was prov-
en,
Like thine, are laid in earth,
Tliere should a wreath be woven
To tell the world their worth;
And I, who woke each morrow
To clasp thy hand in mine,
Who shared thy joy and sorrow,
Whose weal and wo were thine ;
It should be mine to braid it
Around thy faded brow,
But I've in vain essayed it.
And feel I cannot now.
While memory bids me weep thee,
Nor thoughts nor words are free,
The grief is fixed too deeply
That mourns a man like thee.
Francis Bret Harte.
TO A SEA-BIRD.
Sauntering hither on listless wings,
Careless vagabond of the sea.
Little thou heedest the surf that sings,
The bar that thunders, the shale
that rings, —
Give me to keep thy company.
Little thou hast, old friend, that's
new ;
Storjns and wrecks are old things
to thee;
Sick am I of these changes too;
Little to care for, little to rixe, —
I on the shore, and thou on the sea.
All of thy wanderings, far and near.
Bring thee at last to shore and me ;
All of my journeyings end them here,
This our tether must be our cheer, —
I on the shore, and thou on the sea.
Lazily rocking on ocean's breast,
Something in common, old frend,
have we ;
Thou on the shingle seekest thy nest,
I to the waters look for rest, —
I on the shore, and thou on the sea.
LONE MOUNTAIN CEMETERY.
This is that hill of awe
That Persian Sindbad saAf , —
The mount magnetic ;
And on its seaward face.
Scattered along its base,
The wrecks iDrophetic.
Here come the argosies
Blown by each idle breeze.
To and fro shifting;
Yet to the hill of Fate
All drawing, soon or late, —
Day by day drifting, —
Drifting forever here
Barks that for many a year
Braved wind and weather;
Shallops but yesterday
Launched on yon shining bay, —
Drawn all together.
This is the end of all :
Sun thyself by the wall,
O poorer Hiudbad!
Envy not Sindbad's fame:
Here come alike the same,
Hindbad and Sindbad.
HAY.
253
John Hay.
THE PRAIRIE.
The skies are blue above my head,
The j)rairle green below,
And flickering o'er the tufted grass
The shifting shadows go.
Vague-sailing, where the feathery
clouds
Fleck white the tranquil skies,
Black javelins darting where aloft
The whirling pheasant flies.
A glimmering plain in drowsy trance
The dim horizon bounds.
Where all the air is resonant
With sleepy summer sounds.
The life that sings among the flowers,
The lisping of the breeze,
The hot cicala's sultry cry.
The murmurous dreamy bees.
The butterfly, — a flying flower —
Wheels swift in flashing rings,
And flutters round his quiet kin.
With brave flame-mottled wings.
The wild pinks burst in crimson fire,
The jjlilox' bright clusters shine,
And prairie-cups are swinging free
To spill their airy wine.
And lavishly beneath the sun.
In liberal splendor rolled.
The fennel fills the dipping plain
With floods of flowery gold :
And M'idely weaves the iron-weed
A woof of purple dyes
Where Autumn's royal feet may tread
When bankrupt Summer flies.
In verdurous tumidt far away
The prairie-billows gleam.
Upon their crests in blessing rests
The noontide's gracious beam.
Low quivering vapors steaming dim,
The level splendors break
Where languid lilies deck the rim
Of some land-circled lake.
Far in the East like low-hung clouds
The waving woodlands lie :
Far in the West the glowing plain
Melts warjnly in the sky.
No accent wounds the reverent air.
No footprint dints the sod, —
Low in the light the prairie lies
Rapt in a dream of God.
TN A GRAVE YAIiD.
Ix the dewy depths of the graveyard
I lie in the tangled grass.
And watch in the sea of azure.
The white cloud-islands pass.
The birds in the rustling branches
Sing gaily overhead ;
Gray stones like sentinel spectres
Are guarding the silent dead.
The early flowers sleep shaded
In the cool green noonday glooms ;
The broken light falls shuddering
On the cold white face of the tombs.
Without, the world is smiling
In the infinite love of God,
But the sunlight fails and falters
When it falls on the churchyard
sod.
On me the joyous rapture
Of a heart's first love is shed,
But it falls on my heart as coldly
As sunlight on the dead.
REMORSE.
Sad is the thought of sunniest days
Of love and I'apture perished.
And shine through memory's tearful
haze
The eyes once fondliest cherished.
Reproachful is the ghost of toys
That channed while life was
wasted.
But saddest is the thought of joys
That never yet were tasted.
254
HAY.
Sail is tlie vague and tender dream
" I loved, — and, blind with passion-
Of dead love's lingering kisses,
ate love, I fell.
To crushed hearts haloed by the
Love brought me down to death, and
gleam
death to Hell.
Of unreturning blisses ;
For God is just, and death for sin is
Deep mourns the soul in anguished
well.
pride
For the pitiless death that won
" I do not rage against his high de-
them, —
cree,
But the saddest wail is for lips that
Nor for myself do ask that grace shall
died
be:
With the virgin dew upon them.
But for my love on earth who mom-ns
for me.
"Great Spirit! Let me see my love
ON THE BLUFF.
again
And comfort him one hour, and I
O GKAND1.Y flowing River!
were fain
O silver-gliding River!
To pay a thousand years of fire and
Thy springing willows shiver
pain."
In the sunset as of old ;
They shiver in the silence
Then said the pitying angel, "Nay,
Of the willow-whitened islands.
repent
While the sun-bars and the sand-bars
That wild vow! Look, the dial fin-
Fill air and wave with gold.
ger's bent
Down to the last hour of thy punish-
O gay, oblivious River !
ment! "
O sunset-kindled River!
Do you remember ever
But still she wailed, "I jiray thee, let
The eyes and skies so blue
me go!
On a summer day that shone here,
I cannot rise to peace and leave him
When we were all alone here.
so.
And the blue eyes were too wise
O, let me soothe him in his bitter
To speak the love they knew ?
woe! "
O stern impassive River !
The brazen gates ground sullenly ajar,
O still unanswering River !
And upward, joyous, like a rising
The shivering willows quiver
star.
As the night-winds moan and rave.
She rose and vanished in the ether
From the past a voice is calling,
far.
From heaven a star is falling,
And dew swells in the bluebells
But soon adown the dying sunset
Above her hillside grave.
sailing,
And like a woimded bird her pinions
trail in"'.
She fluttered back, with broken-
A IFOMAX'S LOVE.
hearted wailing.
A SENTINEL angel sitting high in
She sobbed, " I found him by the
glory
summer sea
Heard this shrill wail ring out from
Reclined, his head upon a maiden's
Purgatory :
knee, —
" Have mercy, mighty angel, hear my
She curled his hair and kissed him.
story !
Woe is me! "
HAYNE.
255
She wept. " Now let my punish-
ment begin !
I have been fond and foolisli. Let
me in
To expiate my sorrow and my sin."'
Tlie angel answered, " Nay, sad soul,
go higher!
To be deceived in your true heart's
desire
Was bitterer than a thousand years of
fire! "
LAG RIM AS.
God send me tears !
Loose the fierce band that binds my
tired brain,
Give me tlie melting heart of other
years,
And let me weep again !
Before me pass
The shapes of things inexorably true.
Gone is the sparkle of transforming
dew
From every blade of grass.
In life's high noon
Aimless I stand, my promised task
undone.
And raise my hot eyes to the angiy
sun
That will go down too soon.
Turned into gall
Are the sweet joys of childhood's
sunny reign ;
And memory is a torture, love a
chain
That binds my life in thrall.
And childhood's pain
Could to me now the purest rapture
yield;
I pray for tears as in his parching
field
The husbandman for rain.
We pray in vain!
The sullen sky flings down its blaze
of brass ;
The joys of life all scorched and
withering pass ;
I shall not weep again.
Paul Hamilton Hayne.
A SUMMER MOOD.
Ah me ! for evermore, for evermore
These human hearts of om-s must
yearn and sigh.
While down the dells and up the
murmurous shore
Nature renews her immortality.
The heavens of June stretch calm and
bland above,
June roses blush with tints of ori-
ent skies.
But we, by graves of joy, desire, and
love.
Mourn in a world which breathes
of Paradise !
The simshiue mocks the tears it may
not dry,
The breezes — tricksy couriers of the
air, —
Child-roisterers winged, and lightly
fluttering by —
Blow their gay trumpets in the face
of care ;
And bolder winds, the deep sky's
jaassionate speech.
Woven into rhythmic raptures of
desire,
Or fugues of mystic victory, sadly
reach
Our humbled souls, to rack, not
raise them higher!
The field-birds seem to twit us as tbey
pass
With their small blisses, piped so
clear and loud ;
The cricket triumphs o'er us in the
grass,
And the lark, glancing beamlike up
the cloud.
256
HAYNE.
Sings us to scorn with his keen rhap-
sodies:
Small things and great vmconscioiis
tauntings bring
To edge our cares, while we, the
jjroud and wise,
Envy the insect's joy, the birdling's
wing !
And thus for evermore, till time shall
cease.
Man's soul and Nature's — each a
separate sphere —
Revolves, the one in discord, one in
peace.
And who shall make the solemn
mystery clear ?
BY THE AUTUMN SEA.
Fair as the dawn of the fairest day,
.Sad as the evening's tender gray,
By the latest lustre of sunset kissed.
That wavers and wanes through an
amber mist, —
There cometh a dream of the past to
me.
On the desert sands, by the autumn
sea.
All heaven is wrapped in a mystic
veil.
And the face of the ocean is dim and
pale.
And there rises a wind from the chill
northwest.
That seeineth the wail of a soul's
unrest.
As the twilight falls, and the vapors
flee
Far over the wastes of the autumn
sea.
A single ship through the gloaming
glides
Upborne on the swell of the seaward
tides;
And above the gleam of her topmost
spar
Are the virgin eyes of the vesper star
That shine with an angel's ruth on
me, —
A hopeless waif, by the autumn sea.
The wings of the ghostly beach-birds
gleam
Through the shimmering surf, and
the curlew's scream
Falls faintly shrill from the darkeniug
height ;
The first weird sigh on the lips of
Night
Breathes low through the sedge and
the blasted tree.
With a murnuir of doom, by the au-
tumn sea.
Oh, sky-enshadowed and yearning
main.
Your gloom but deepens this hmudn
I)ain ;
Those waves seem big with a name-
less care.
That sky is a type of the heart's
despair.
As I linger and muse by the sombre
lea.
And the night-shades close on the
autumn sea.
THE WOODLAXD.
Yon woodland, like a human mind.
Has many a phase of dark and
light;
Now dim with shadows wandering
blind,
Now radiant with fair shapes of
light;
They softly come, they softly go.
Capricious as the vagrant wind, —
Nature's vague thoughts in gloom or
glow,
That leave no airiest trace behind.
No trace, no trace; yet wherefore
thus
Do shade and beam our spirits
stir?
Ah! Nature may be cold to us.
But we are strangely moved by her !
The wild bird's strain, the breezy
spray.
Each hour with sure earth-changes
rife,
HAYNE.
257
Hint more than all the sages say,
Or poets sing, of death or life!
For, truth half drawn from Nature's
breast,
Through subtlest types of form and
tone,
Outweigh what man at most hath
guessed,
While heeding his own heart alone.
And midway betwixt heaven and us
Stands Nature, in her fadeless grace.
Still pointing to our Father's house.
His glory on her mystic face!
WINDLESS BAIN.
The rain, the desolate rain!
Ceaseless, and solemn, and chill !
How it drips on the misty pane,
IIow it drenches the darkened sill!
O scene of sorrow and dearth!
I would that the wind awaking
To a fierce and gusty birth
Might vary this dull refrain
Of the rain, the desolate rain:
For the heart of heaven seems
breaking
In tears o'er the fallen earth,
And again, again, again.
We list to the sombre strain.
The faint, cold, monotone —
Whose soul is a mystic moan —
Of the rain, the mournful rain.
The soft, despairing rain !
The rain, the murmurous rain !
Weary, passionless, slow,
'T is the rhythm of settled sorroM'.
'T is the sobbing of cureless woe!
And all the tragic life.
The pathos of Long-Ago,
Comes back on the sad refrain
Of the rain, the dreary rain.
Till the graves in my heart unclose
And the dead who are bm'ied there
From a solemn and weird repose
Awake, — but with eyeballs drear,
And voices that melt in pain
On the tide of the plaintive rain.
The yearning, hopeless rain.
The long, low, whispering rain ?
THE STING OF DEATH.
I FEAR thee not, O Death! nay, oft
I pine
To clasp thy passionless bosom to
mine own, —
And on thy heart sob out my latest
moan.
Ere lapped and lost in thy strange
sleep divine;
But much I fear lest that chill breath
of thine
Should freeze all tender memories
into stone, —
Lest ruthless and malign Oblivion
Quench the last spark that lingers on
love's shrine: —
O God! to moidder through dark,
dateless years, —
The while all loving ministries shall
cease,
And Time assuage the fondest mourn-
er's tears! —
Here lies the sting! — this, ooks of familiar love, that never
more,
Xever on earth, our acliing eyes
shall meet.
Past words of welcome to our house-
hold door.
And vanished smiles, and sounds
of parted feet, —
Spring, midst the murmurs of thy
flowering trees,
Wliy, why rev i vest tliou these ?
Vain longings for the dead! — why
come they back
With tliy young birds, and leaves,
and living blooms ?
Oh, is it not that from thine earthly
track
Hope to thy world may look be-
yond the tombs '?
Yes, gentle Spring; no sorrow dims
thine air,
Breathed by our loved ones
there.
HEMANS.
2t>l
THE INVOCATION.
Answer me, burning stars of night I
Wliere is the spirit gone,
Tliat past tlie reacli of liuman sight,
Even as a breeze, hath flown ?
And tlie stars answered me, —"We
roll
In light and power on high,
But, of the never-dying soul,
Ask things that cannot die!"
Oh ! many-toned and chaiuless Avind !
Thou art a wanderer free ;
Tell me if thou its place canst find,
Far over mount and sea ?
And the Mind murnuu'ed in reply,
" The blue deep 1 have crossed,
And met its barks and billows high.
But not what thou hast lost!"
Ye clouds that gorgeously repose
Around the setting sun,
Answer! have ye a liome for those
Whose earthly race is run ?
The bright clouds answered, — *'We
depart,
We vanish from the sky ;
Ask what is deathless in thy heart
For that which cannot die! "
Speak, then, thou voice of (iod
within !
Thou of the deep low tone!
Answer me through life's restless din,
Where is the spirit flown ?
And the voice answered, "Be thou
still !
Enough to know is given ;
Clouds, winds, and stars their task
fulfil;
Thine is to trust in Heaven! "
THE HOUR OF DEATH.
Lkaves have their time to fall.
And flowers to wither at the north-
wind's breath,
And stars to set, — but all,
Thou hast all seasons for thine own,
oh! Death.
Day is for mortal care,
Eve for glad meetings round the joy-
ous hearth.
Night for the dreams of sleep, the
voice of prayer, —
But all for thee, thou mightiest of
the earth.
The banquet hath its hour.
Its feverish hoin- of mirth, and song,
and wine ;
There comes a day for grief's o'er-
whelming power,
A time for softer tears, — but all are
thine.
Youth and the opening rose
May look like things too glorious for
decay.
And smiie at thee, — but thou art
not of those
That wait the ripened bloom to seize
their prey.
Leaves have their time to fall.
And flowers to wither at the north-
wind's breath.
And stars to set, — but all.
Thou hast all seasons for thine own,
oh! Death.
We know when moons shall Avane.
When summer-birds from far shall
cross the sea,
When autumn's hue shall tinge the
golden grain, —
But who shall teach us when to look
for thee ?
Is it when spring's first gale
Comes forth to whisper where the
violets lie ?
Is it when roses in our paths grow
pale y
They have one season, — all are ours
to die!
Thou art where billows foam,
Thou art where music melts upon the
air;
Thou art around us in ourj^eaceful
home.
And the world calls us forth, — and
thou art thei'e.
262
HEMANS.
Thou art where friend meets friend,
Beneath the shadow of the ehn to
rest, —
Tliou art where foe meets foe, and
trumpets rend
The skies, and swords beat down the
princely crest.
Leaves have tlieir time to fall,
And flowers to wither at the north-
wind's breath.
And stars to set, — but all,
Thou hast all seasons for thine own,
oh! Death.
EVENING PliAYER AT A GIRLS'
SCHOOL.
Hush! 'tis a holy hour, — the quiet
room
Seems like a temple, while yon
soft lamp sheds
A faint and starry radiance, through
the gloom
And the sweet stillness, down on
bright young heads.
With all their clustering locks, un-
touched by care.
And bowed, as flowers are bowed
with night, — in prayer.
Gaze on, — 'tis lovely! — childhood's
lip and cheek.
Mantling beneath its earnest brow
of thought.
Gaze, — yet what seest thou in those
fair, and meek,
And fragile things, as but for sun-
shine wrought ?
Thou seest what grief must nurtm-e
for the sky,
What death must fashion for eternity !
Oh ! joyous creatures, that will sink
to rest.
Lightly, when those pure orisons
are done.
As birds with slumber's honey-dew
oppressed,
'Midst the dim folded leaves, at set
of sun, —
Lift up your hearts! — though yet no
sorrow lies
Dark in the summer-heaven of those
clear eyes ;
Though fresh within your breasts the
untroubled springs
Of hope make melody where'er ye
tread ;
And o'er your sleep bright shadows,
from the wings
Of spirits visiting but youth, be
spread ;
Yet in those flute-like voices, ming-
ling low,
Is woman's tenderness, — how soon
her woe.
Iler lot is on you, — silent tears to
weep.
And patient smiles to wear through
suffering's hour,
And sumless riches, from affection's
deep,
To pour on broken I'eeds, — a wasted
shower! [clay.
And to make idols, and to find them
And to bewail that worship, — there-
fore pray!
Her lot is on you, — to be found un-
tired.
Watching the stars out by the bed
of pain,
With a pale cheek, and yet a brow
inspired.
And a true heart of hope, though
hope be vain. [decay.
Meekly to bear with wrong, to cheer
And oh ! to love through all things, —
therefore pray !
And take the thought of this calm
vesper time,
With its low miu'muring sounds
and silvery light.
On through the dark days fading from
their prime.
As a sweet dew to keep your souls
from bliglit.
Earth will forsake,— oh! happy to
have given
The unbroken heart's first fragrance
unto Heaven!
HERBERT.
263
LANDING OF THE PILGRIMS.
The breaking waves dashed high.
On a stern and rocic-bound coast,
And tlie woods against a stormy sky
Their giant brandies tossed ;
And the lieavy niglit hung dark
The liills and waters o'er,
When a band of exiles moored their
bark
On the wild New England shore.
Not as the conqueror comes,
They, the true-hearted came;
Not with the roll of the stirring
drums,
And the trumpet that sings of
fame;
Not as the flying come,
In silence and in fear; —
They shook the depths of the desert
gloom
With their hymns of lofty cheer.
Amidst the storm they sang,
And the stars heard, and the sea;
And the sounding aisles of the dim
woods rang
To the anthem of the free!
The ocean eagle soared
From his nest by the white wave's
foam ;
And the rocking pines of the forest
roared —
This was their welcome home !
There were men with hoary hair
Amidst that pilgrim band:
Why had they come to wither there.
Away from their childhood's land ?
There was woman's fearless eye.
Lit by her deep love's truth;
There was manhood's brow serenely
high.
And the fiery heart of youth.
What sought they thus afar ?
Bright jewels of the mine ?
The wealth of seas, the spoils of
war ? —
They sought a faith's pure shrine!
Ay, call it holy ground.
The soil where first they trod.
They liave left unstained what there
they found —
Freedom to worship God.
CALM ON THE liOSOM OF OUR
GOD.
Calm on the bosom of our God,
Fair spirit! rest thee now!
E'en while with us thy footsteps trod,
His seal was on thy brow.
Dust to its narrow house beneath !
Soul to its place on high!
They that have seen thy look in death
No more may fear to die.
George Herbert.
THE PULLEY.
When God at first made man,
Having a glass of blessing standing
by:
Let us (said he) pour on him all we
can :
Let the world's riches, which dispersed
lie.
Contract into a span.
So strength first made a way ;
Then beauty fiow'd, then wisdom,
honor, pleasure:
When almost all was out, God made
a stay,
Perceiving that alone, of all his
treasure.
Rest in the bottom lay.
•264
HERBERT.
For If I should (said he)
Bestow this jewel also on my crea-
ture,
He would adore my gifts instead of
me,
And rest in Nature, not the God of
Nature :
So both should losers be.
Yet let him keep the rest,
But keep them with rcpinuig restless-
ness :
Let him be rich and weary, that at
least,
If goodness lead him not, yet weari-
ness
May toss him to my breast.
[From the Cliurch Porch ]
ADVICE ON CHURCH BEHAVIOR.
When once thy foot enters the
church, be bare.
God is more tliere than thou : for thou
art there
Only by his permission. Then be-
ware.
And make thyself all reverence and
fear.
Kneeling ne'er spoil'd silk stock-
ings : quit thy state.
All equal are within the church's
gate.
Resort to sermons, but to prayers
most:
Praying's the end of preaching. O
be drest;
Stay not for the other pin: why thou
hast lost
A joy for it worth worlds. Thus hell
doth jest
Away thy blessings, and extremely
flout thee.
Thy clothes being fast, but thy soul
loose about tliee.
In time of service seal up both thine
eyes.
And send them to thine heart; that
spying sin,
They may weep out the stains by
them did rise:
Those doors being shut, all by the
ear comes in.
Who marks in church-time other
symmetry.
Makes all their beauty his de-
formity.
Let vain or busy thoughts have there
no part :
Bring not thy plough, thy plots, thy
pleasure thither
Christ purged the temple; so must
thou thy heart.
All Worldly thoughts are but these
met together
To cozen thee. Look to thy ac-
tions well :
For churches either are our heaven
or hell.
Judge not the preacher ; for he is thy
judge:
If thou mislike him, thou conceivest
him not.
God calleth preaching folly. Do not
grudge
To pick out treasures from an earthen
pot.
The worst speak something good :
if all want sense,
God takes a text and preaches pa-
tience.
[From the Church Pot-ch.]
SUM UP AT NIGHT.
StJM up at night, what thou hast
done by day ;
And in the morning, what thou hast
to do.
Dress and undress thy soul: mark
the decay
And growth of it: if with thy watch
that too
Be down, then wind up both, since
we sliall be
Most surely judged, make thy ac-
counts agree.
HEBRICK.
265
In brief, acquit thee bravely ; play the
man,
Look not on pleasures as they come,
but go.
Defer not the least virtue; life's poor
span
Make not an ell, by triflinii' in thy wo.
If thou do ill, the joy fades, not the
pains :
If well ; the pain doth fade, the joy
remains.
BOSOM SIN.
Lord, with what care hast thou be-
girt us round !
Parents first season us : then school-
masters
Deliver us to laws: they send us
bound
To rules of reason, holy messengers.
Pulpits and Sundays, sorrow dogging
sin,
Afflictions sorted, anguish of all
sizes.
Fine nets and stratagems to catch
us in.
Bibles laid open, millions of sur-
prises,
Blessings beforehand, ties of grate-
fulness.
The sound of glory ringing in our
ears ;
Without, our shame; within, our
consciences;
Angels and grace, eternal hopes and
fears.
Yet all these fences and their whole
array
One cunning bosom-sin blows quite
away.
VIRTUE.
Sw^EET day, so cool, so calm, so
bright.
The bridal of the earth and sky;
The dew shall weep thy fall to-night;
For thou must die.
Sweet rose, whose hue angry and
brave
Bids the rash gazer wipe his eye,
Thy root is ever in its grave.
And thou must die.
Sweet spring, full of sweet days and
roses.
A box where sweets compacted lie.
My music shows ye have your closes,
And all must die.
Only a sweet and virtuous soul.
Like seasoned timber, never gives ;
But though the whole world turn to
coal,
Then chiefly lives.
Robert Herrick.
TO PERILLA.
Ah, my Perilla! dost thou grieve to
see
Me, day by day, to steal away from
thee ?
Age calls me hence, and my gray
hairs bid come.
And haste away to mine eternal
home;
'Twill not be long, Perilla, after this
That I must give thee the supremest
kiss.
Dead when I am, first cast in salt,
and bring [spring.
Part of the cream from that religious
With which, Perilla, wash my hands
and feet ;
That done, then wind me in that
very sheet
266
HERRICK.
Which wrapt, thy smooth Hmbs when
thou didst implore
The gods' protection, but the niglit
before ;
Follow me weeping to my turf, and
there
Let fall a primrose, and with it a
tear.
Then lastly, let some weekly strew-
ings be
Devoted to the memory of me ;
Then shall my ghost not walk about,
but keep
Still in the cool and silent shades of
sleep.
THE PRIMROSE.
Ask me why I send you here
This sweet infanta of the year '?
Ask me why I send to you
This primrose, thus bepearled with
dew?
1 will whisper to your ears.
The sweets of love are mixed with
tears.
Ask me why this flower does show
So yellow green and sickly too ?
Ask me why the stalk is weak
And bending, yet it doth not break ?
I will answer, these discover
What fainting hopes are in a lover.
THREE EPITAPHS.
UPON A CHILI)
Here she lies, a pretty bud,
Lately made of flesh and blood;
Who so soon fell fast asleep
As her little eyes did peep.
Give her strewings, but not stir.
The earth that lightly covers her !
L7PON A CHILD.
Virgins promised when I died.
That they would, each primrose-tide,
Duly morn and evening come.
And with flowers dress my tomb :
Having promised, pay your debts,
Maids, and here strew violets.
UPON A MAID.
Here she lies, in beds of spice.
Fair as Eve in paradise;
For her beauty it was such.
Poets could not praise too much.
Virgins," come, and in a ring
Her supremest requiem sing; ,
Then depart, but see ye tread
Lightly, lightly o'er the dead.
HOW THE HEART- S EASE FIRST
CAME.
Frolic virgins once these were,
Over-loving, living here;
Being here their ends denied,
Kan for sweethearts mad and died.
Love, in pity of their tears.
And their loss of blooming years.
For their restless here-spent hours,
Gave them heart' s-ease turned to
flowers.
LITANY TO THE HOLY SPIRIT.
In the hour of my distress
When temptations me oppress.
And when I my sins confess.
Sweet Spirit, comfort me !
When I lie within my bed.
Sick at heart, and sick in head,
And with doubts discomforted,
Sweet Spirit, comfort me!
When the house doth sigh and weep,
And the world is drowned in sleep.
Yet mine eyes the watch do keep.
Sweet Spirit, comfort me!
When the artless doctor sees
No one hope, but of his fees,
And his skill runs on the lees,
Sweet Spirit, comfort me.
When his potion and his pill,
His or none or little skill,
Meet for nothing, but to kill —
Sweet Spirit, comfort me!
HERVEY.
267
\A'lien the passing bell doth toll,
And the Furies, in a shoal,
Come to fright a parting soul,
Sweet Spirit, comfort me !
When the tapers now burn blue.
And the comforters are few.
And that number more than true,
Sweet Spirit, comfort me !
When the priest his last hath prayed.
And I nod to what he said
Because my speech is now decayed.
Sweet Spirit, comfort me !
When, God knows, I'm tost about
Either with despair or doubt.
Yet before the glass be out,
Sweet Spirit, comfort me !
Wlien the Tempter me pursu'th.
With the sins of all my youth.
And half damns me with untruth
Sweet Spirit, comfort me !
When the flames and hellish cries
Fright mine ears, and fright mine
eyes,
And all terrors me surprise.
Sweet Spirit, comfort me.
When the judgment is revealed.
And that opened which was sealed —
When to Thee I have appealed.
Sweet Spirit, comfort me.
TO KEEP A TRUE LENT.
Is this a fast — to keep
The larder lean.
And clean
From fat of veals and sheep ?
Is it to quit the dish
Of flesh, vet still
To m
The platter high with fish ?
Is it to fast an hour —
Or ragged go —
Or show
A downcast look, and sour ?
No! 'tis a fast to dole
Thy sheaf of wheat,
And meat.
Unto the hungry soul.
It is to fast from strife.
From old debate,
And hate —
To circumcise thy life.
To show a heart grief-rent;
To starve thy sin,
Not bin —
And that's to keep thy Lent.
Thomas Kibble Hervey.
CLEOPATRA EMBARKING ON THE
CYDNUS. I
Fi.uTES in the sunny air!
And harps in the porphyry
halls! I
And a low, deep hum like a people's I
prayer.
With its heart-breathed swells and
falls!
And an echo like the desert's call,
Flung back to the shouting shores!
And the river's ripple heard through
all.
As it plays with the silver oars! —
The sky is a gleam of gold,
And the amber breezes float
Like thoughts to be dreamed of, but
never told.
Around the dancing boat!
She has stepped on the burning sand ;
And the thousand tongues are
mute,
And the Syrian strikes with a trem-
bling hand
The strings of his gilded lute!
And the Ethiop's heart throbs loud
and high
Beneath his white syraar,
268
HEYWOOD.
And the Libyan kneels, as he meets
her eye,
Like tlie flasli of an eastern star!
Tlie gales may not be heard,
Yet the silken streamers quiver.
And the vessel shoots, like a bright-
plumed bird.
Away down the golden river !
Away by the lofty mount.
And away by the lonely shore.
And away by the gushing of many a
fount.
Where fountains gush no more! —
Oh, for some warning vision there,
Some voice that should have spoken
Of climes to be laid waste and bare
And glad youjig spirits broken!
Of waters dried away.
And hope and beauty blasted !
That scenes so fair and hearts so gay
Should be so early wasted !
EPITAPH.
Farewei.i. ! since nevermore for thee
The sun comes up our earthly skies.
Less bright henceforth shall sun-
shine be [eyes.
To some fond hearts and saddened
There are who, for thy last long sleep.
Shall sleep as sweetly nevermore.
Must weep because thou canst not
weep,
And grieve that all thy griefs are o'er.
Sad thrift of love! — the loving breast,
Whereon thine aching head was
thrown.
Gave up the weary head, to rest.
But kept the aching for its own.
Till pain shall find the same low bed
That pillows now thy painless head.
And following darkly through the
night, I light.
Love reach thee by the founts of
Thomas Heywood.
GOOD-MOPiROW.
Pack clouds away, and welcome day,
With night we banish sorrow ;
Sweet air, blow soft; mount, larks,
aloft,
To give my love good-morrow,
Wings from the wind to please her
mind,
Notes from the lark I'll borrow;
Bird, prune thy wing,nighlingale,sing,
To give my love good-morrow.
Wake from thy nest, robin red-
breast.
Sing, birds, in every furrow;
And from each hill let music shrill
Give my fair love good-morrow.
Blackbird and thrush in every
bush.
Stare, linnet, and cock-sparrow;
You pretty elves, among yourselves,
Sing my fair love good-morrow.
HIGGINSON. — niLLARD.
269
Thomas Wentworth Higginson.
DECORATION.
" Manihus date lUiaplenis."
'Mid the flower-wreathed tombs I
stand,
Bearing lilies in my hand.
Comrades ! in what soldier-grave
Sleeps the bravest of the brave ?
Is it he who sank to rest
With his colors round his breast ?
Friendship makes his tomb a shrine,
Garlands veil it ; ask not mine.
One lone grave, yon trees beneath.
Bears no roses, wears no wreath ;
Yet no heart more high and warm
Ever dared the battle-storm.
Never gleamed a prouder eye
In the front of victory :
Never foot had firmer tread
On the field where hope lay dead,
Than are hid within this tomb.
Where the untended grasses bloom;
And no stone, with feigned distress.
Mocks the sacred loneliness.
Youth and beauty, dauntless will.
Dreams that life could ne'er fulfil,
Here lie buried — here in peace
Wrongs and woes have found re-
lease.
Turning from my comrades' eyes.
Kneeling where a woman lies.
I strew lilies on the grave
Of the bravest of the brave.
George Stillman Hillard.
LAKE GEORGE.
How oft in visions of the night.
How oft in noonday dreaming.
I've seen, fair lake, thy forest wave, —
Have seen thy waters gleaming;
Have heard the blowing of the winds
That sweep along thy highlands.
And the light laughter of the waves
That dance around thine islands.
It was a landscape of the mind,
With forms and hues ideal.
But still those hues and forms ap-
peared
More lovely than aught real.
I feared to see the breathing scene,
And brooded o'er the vision.
Lest the hard touch of truth should
mar
A picture so Elysian.
But now I break the cold distrust
Whose spells so long had bound me ;
The shadows of the night are past,—
The morning shines around me.
And in the sober light of day,
I see. with eyes enchanted,
The glorious vision that so long
My day and night dreams haunted.
I see the green, translucent wave,
The purest of earth's fountains:
I see the many-winding shore, —
The double range of mountains:
One, neighbor to the flying clouils,
And crowned with leaf and blossom,
And one, more lovely, borne within
The lake's unruttied bosom.
O timid heart! with thy glad throbs
Some self-reproach is blended.
At the long years that died before
The sight of scene so splendid.
The mind has pictures of its own,
Fair trees and waters flowing —
But not a magic whole like this.
So living, breathing, glowing;
Strength imaged in the wooded hills,
A grand, primeval nature.
270
HOFFMAN.
Anil beauty mirrored in the lake,
A gentler, softer feature ;
A perfect union, — wliere no want
Upon the soul is pressing;
Like manly power and female grace
Made one by bridal blessing.
Nor is the stately scene without
Its sweet, secluded treasiu-es.
Where hearts that shun the crowd
may find
Their own exclusive pleasures ;
Deep chasms of shade for pensive
thought,
The hours to wear away in ;
And vaulted aisles, of whispering pine.
For lovers' feet to stray in ;
Clear streams that from the uplands
run,
A course of sunless shadow ;
Isles all imfurrowed by the i^lough.
And strips of fertile meadow ;
And rounded coves of silver sand,
Where moonlight plays and glances, —
A sheltered hall for elfin horns,
A floor for elfin dances.
No tame monotony is here,
But beauty ever changing ;
With clouds, and shadows of the
clouds.
And mists the hillsides ranging.
Where morning's gold, and noon's
hot sim,
Their changing glories render;
Pour round the shores a varying
light.
Now glowing and now tender.
But purer than the shifting gleams
By liberal sunshine given,
Is the deep spirit of that hour, —
An efHuence breathed from heaven;
When the unclouded, yellow moon
Hangs o'er the eastern ridges.
And the long shaft of trembling
gold.
The trembling crystal bridges.
Farewell, sweet lake! brief were the
hours
Along thy banks for straying;
But not farewell what memory
takes, —
An image undecaying.
I hold secure beyond all change
One lovely recollection,
To cheer the hours of lonely toil.
And chase away dejection.
Charles Fenno Hoffman.
MONTE RE Y.
We were not many, — we who stood
Before the iron sleet that day;
Yet many a gallant spirit would
Give half his years if but he could
Have been with vis at Monterey.
Now here, now there, the shot it
hailed
In deadly drifts of fiery spray.
Yet not a single soldier quailed
When wounded comrades round them
wailed
Their dying shouts at Monterey.
And on, still on our cohunn kept,
Through walls of fianie, its wither-
ing way;
Where fell the dead, the living
stept,
Still charging on the guns which
swept
The slippery streets of Monterey.
The foe himself recoiled aghast.
When, striking whei'e he strongest
lay,
We swooped his flanking batteries
past,
HOGG — HOLLAND.
271
And, braving full their murderous
blast.
Stormed home the towers of Mon-
terey.
Our banners on those turrets wave,
And there our evening bugles play ;
Where orange boughs above their
grave
Keep green the memorj' of the bravt;
Who fouglit and fell at Monterey.
We are not many, — we who pressed
Beside the brave who fell that
day:
But who of us has not confessed
He'd rather share their warrior rest
Than not have been at Monterey ?
James Hogg.
THE SKYLARK.
Bird of the wilderness
Blithesome and cumberless.
Sweet be thy matin o'er moorland
and lea !
Emblem of happiness.
Blest is thy dwelling-place —
Oh, to abide in the desert with thee !
Wild is thy lay and loud.
Far in the downy cloud,
Love gives itenergy,love gave it birth,
Where, on thy dewy wing,
Where art thou journeying ?
Thy lay is in heaven, thy love is on
earth.
O'er fell and fountain sheen.
O'er moor and mountain green,
O'er the red streamer that heralds the
day.
Over the cloudlet dim.
Over the rainbow's rim,
Musical cherub, soar, singing, away!
Then, when the gloaming comes.
Low in the lieather blooms.
Sweet will thy welcome and bed of
love be !
Emblem of happiness.
Blest is thy dwelling-place —
Oh, to abide in the desert with tlioe I
JosiAH Gilbert Holland.
[From Bitter-Sweef.]
A SONG OF DOUBT.
The day is quenched, and the sun is
fled;
God has forgotten the world !
The moon is gone, and the stars are
dead ;
God has forgotten the world !
Evil has won In the horrid feud
Of ages with The Throne ;
Evil stands on the neck of Good,
And rules the world alone.
There is no good ; there is no God ;
And Faith is a heartless cheat
Who bares the backfor the Devil's rod.
And scatters thorns for the feet.
What are prayers in the lips of death.
Filling and chilling with hail ?
What are prayers but wasted breatli
Beaten back by the gale '?
[fled;
The day is quenched, and the sun is
God iias forgotten the world !
The moon is gone, and the stars are
dead;
God has forgotten the world !
272
HOLLAND.
[From Bitter- Sweet.]
A SONG OF FAFFH.
Day will return with a freslier boon;
God will reiueniber the world !
Night will come with a newer moon ;
God will remember the world !
Evil is only the slave of Good;
Sorrow the servant of Joy ;
And the soul is mad that refuses food
Of the meanest in God's employ.
The fountain of joy is fed by tears,
And love is lit by the breath of
sighs ;
The deepest griefs and the wildest
fears
Have holiest ministries.
Strong grows the oak in the sweeping
storm ;
Safely the flower sleeps under the
snow ;
And the farmer's hearth is never
warm
Till the cold wind starts to blow.
Day will return with a fresher boon;
(iod will remember the world !
Night will come with a newer moon;
God will remember the world !
[From Bitter-Stveet.]
WHAT IS THE LITTLE OXE
THINKING ABOUT?
What is the little one thinking
about ?
Very wonderful things, no doubt.
Unwritten history !
Unfathomed mystery !
Yet he laughs and cries, and eats and
drinks,
And chuckles and crows, and nods
and winks.
As if his head were as full of kinks
And curious riddles as any sphinx!
Waqied by colic, and wet by tears.
Punctured by pins, and tortured by
fears,
Our little nephew will lose two years;
And he'll never know
Where the summers go; —
He need not laugh, for he'll (in 1 it so!
Who can tell what a baby thinks ?
Who can follow the gossamer links
I>y which the manikin feels his way
Out from the shore of the great un-
known.
Blind, and wailing, and all alone.
Into the light of day "? —
Out from the shore of the unknown
sea,
Tossing in pitiful agony, —
Of the unknown sea that reels and
rolls.
Specked with the barks of little
souls, —
Barks that were launched on the
other side,
And slipped from heaven on an ebb-
ing tide !
What does he think of his mother's
eyes ?
What does he think of his moth-
er's hair?
What of the cradle-roof that flies
Forward and backward through
the air?
What does he think of his moth-
er's breast, —
Bare and beautiful, smooth and white.
Seeking it ever with fresh delight, —
Cup of his life and couch of his rest ?
What does he think when lier quick
embrace
Presses his hand and buries his face
Deep where the heart-throbs sink
and swell
With a tenderness she can never tell.
Though she mui-mur the words
Of all the birds, —
Words she has learned to murmur
well ?
Now he thinks he'll go to sleep!
I can see the shadow creep
Over his eyes in soft eclipse.
Over his brow, and over his lips,
Out to his little finger-tips;
Softly sinking, down he goes !
Down he goes ! Down he goes !
See! He is hushed in sweet re-
pose!
\_From Bitter-iiireef.]
STRENGTH THROUGH RESISTED
TEMPTATION.
God loves not sin, nor I; but in the
throng
Of evils that assail us, there are none
That yield their strength to Virtue's
struggling arm
With sucli munificent reward of
power
As great temptations. We may win
by toil
Endurance ; saintly fortitude by pain ;
By sickness, patience ; faith and trust
by fear;
But the great stimulus that spurs to
life,
And crowds to generous development
Each chastened power and iiassion of
the soul,
Is the temptation of the soul to sin,
Kesisted, and reconquered, evermore.
[From Bitter-Sweet.]
THE PRESS OF SORROW.
Heauts, like apples, are hard and
sour.
Till crushed by Pain's resistless
power ;
And yield their juices rich and bland
To none but .Sorrow's heavy hand.
The purest streams of human love
Flow naturally never.
But gush by pressure from above.
With God's hand on the lever.
The first are turbidest and meanest ;
The last are sweetest and serenest.
[From Bitter-Sweet.]
LIFE FROM DEATH.
Life evermore is fed by death,
In earth and sea and sky ;
And, that a rose may breathe its
breath.
Something must die.
Earth is a sepulchre of flowers,
AVhose vitalizing mould
Through boundless transmutation
towers.
In green and gold.
The oak-tree, struggling with the
blast.
Devours its father-tree.
And sheds its leaves and drops its
mast,
That more may be.
The falcon preys upon the finch,
The finch upon the fly,
And nought will loose the hunger-
pinch
But death's wild cry.
The milk-haired heifer's life must
pass
That it may fill your own.
As passed the sweet life of the
grass
She fed upon.
The power enslaved by yonder cask
Shall many burdens bear;
Shall nerve the toiler at his task.
The soul at prayer.
From lowly woe springs lordly joy;
From humbler good diviner;
The greater life must aye destroy
And drink the minor.
From hand to hand life's cup is
passed
Up Being's piled gradation,
Till men to angels yield at last
The rich collation.
[From liitter-Siceef.]
WORTH AND COST.
Thus is it over all the earth !
That which we call the fairest.
And i^rize for its siu'passing worth.
Is always rarest.
Iron is heaped in mountain piles.
And gluts the laggard forges:
But gold-flakes gleam in dim defiles
And lonely gorges.
The snowy marble flecks the land
With heaped and rounded ledges,
But diamonds hide within the sand
Their starry edges.
The finny armies clog the twine
That sweeps the lazy river.
But pearls come singly from the brine,
With the pale diver.
God gives no value unto men
Unmatched by meed of labor;
And Cost, of Worth, has ever been
The closest neighbor.
Wide is the gate and broad the way
That opens to perdition.
And countless multitudes are they
AVho seek admission.
But strait the gate, the path unkind.
That leads to life immortal.
And few the careful feet that find,
The hidden portal.
All common good has common price ;
Exceeding good, exceeding;
Christ bought the keys of Paradise
By cruel bleeding ;
And every soul that wins a place
Upon its hills of pleasure,
Must give its all, and beg for grace
To fill the measure.
[From Bitter-Sweet.]
CUADLE SOJSFG.
Hither, Sleep ! a mother wants thee !
Come with velvet arms!
Fold the baby that she grants thee
To thy own soft charms !
Bear him into Dreamland lightly!
Give liim sight of flowers !
Do not bring him back till brightly
Break the morning hours !
Close his eyes with gentle fingers !
Cross his hands of snow !
Tell the angels wliere he lingers
They must whisper low !
1 will guard thy si)oll unbroken
If thou hear my call ;
Come, then. Sleep! I wait the token
Of thy downy thrall.
Now I see his sweet lips moving;
He is in thy keep;
Other milk the babe is proving
At the breast of Sleep !
[From Ditter-Siceet.']
TO AN INFANT SLEEPING.
Sleep, babe, the honeyed sleep of
innocence!
Sleep like a bud ; for soon the sun of
life
With ardors quick and passionate
shall rise.
And with hot kisses, part the fra-
grant lips —
The folded petals of thy soul! Alas!
What feverish winds shall tease and
toss thee, then !
Wliat pride and pain, ambition and
despair.
Desire, satiety, and all that fill
With misery, life's fretful enterprise,
Shall wrench and blanch thee, till
thou fall at last,
Joy after joy down-fluttering to the
earth.
To be apportioned to the elements !
I marvel, baby, whether it were ill
That he who planted thee should
pluck thee now.
And save thee from the blight that
comes on all.
I marvel whether it would not be well
That the frail bud should burst in
Paradise,
On the full throbbing of an angel's
heart !
THE TYPE OF STRUGGLING
HUMANITY.
IjAocoox! thou great embodiment
Of human life and human history !
Thou record of the past, thou proph-
ecy
Of the sad future, thou majestic voice,
PeaUng along tlie ages from old time I
Thou wail of agonized humanity !
There lives no thought in marble like
to thee !
Thou hast no kindred in the Vatican,
But standest separate among the
dreams
Of old mythologies — alone — alone !
The beautiful Apollo at thy side
Is but a marble dream, and dreams
are all
The gods and goddesses and fauns
and fates
That populate these wondrous halls ;
but thou,
Standing among them, liftest up thy-
self
In majesty of meaning, till they sink
Far from the sight, no more signifi-
cant
Than the poor toys of children. For
thou art
A voice from out the world's experi-
ence,
Speaking of all the generations past
To all the generations yet to come
Of the long struggle, the sublime de-
spair.
The wild and weaiy agony of man !
ON THE RIGHI.
On the Righi Kulm we stood,
Lovely Floribel and I,
While tiie morning's crimson flood
Streamed along the eastern sky.
Reddened every mountain-peak
Into rose from twilight dun ;
But the blush upon her cheek
Was not lighted by the sun !
On the Righi Kulm we sat.
Lovely Floribel and I,
Plucking bluebells for her hat
From a mound that blossomed
nigh.
" We are near to heaven," she sighed,
While her I'aven lashes fell.
" Nearer," softly I replied,
" Than the mountain's height may
tell."
Down the Righi' s side we sped.
Lovely Floribel and I,
But her morning blush had fled
And the bluebells all were dry.
Of the height the dream was born;
Of the lower air it died ;
And the passion of the morn
Flagged and fell at eventide.
From the breast of blue Lucerne,
Lovely Floribel and I
Saw the brand of sunset burn
On the Righi Kulm, and die.
And we wondered, gazing thus.
If our dream would still remain
On the height, and wait for us
Till we climb to heaven again !
WHAT WILL IT MATTER?
If life awake and will never cease
On the future's distant shore.
And the rose of love and the lily of
peace
Shall bloom there forevermore, —
Let the world go round and round.
And the sim sink into the sea;
For whether I'm on or inider the
ground.
Oh, what will it matter to me ?
276
HOLME — HOLMES.
Saxe Holme.
THREE KISSES OF FAREWELL.
Three, only three, my darling,
Separate, solemn, slow;
Not like the swift and joyous ones,
We used to know
When we kissed because we loved
each other
Simply to taste love's sweet,
And lavished our kisses as the sum-
mer
Lavishes heat ; —
But as they kiss whose hearts are
wrung.
When hope and fear are spent,
And nothing is left to give except
A sacrament !
First of the three, my darling,
Is sacred unto pain ;
We have hurt each other often :
We shall again,
When we pine because we miss each
other.
And do not miderstand.
How the written words are so much
colder
Than eye and hand.
I kiss thee, dear, for all such pain
Which we may give or take ;
Buried, forgiven, before it comes.
For our love's sake!
The second kiss, my darling.
Is full of joy's sweet thrill;
We have blessed each other always ;
We always will.
We shall reach till we feel each other.
Past all of time and space ;
We shall listen till we hear each
other
In every place;
The earth is full of messengers
Which love sends to and fro ;
I kiss thee, darling, for all joy
Which we shall know !
The last kiss, oh, my darling,
My love — I cannot see
Through my tears, as I remember
What It may be.
We may die and never see each other.
Die with no time to give
Any sign that our hearts are faithful
To die, as live.
Token of what they will not see
Who see our parting breath,
This one last kiss, my darling, seals
The seal of death !
Oliver Wendell Holmes.
THE VOICELESS.
We count the broken lyi-es that rest
Where the sweet wailing singers
slumber.
But o'er their silent sister's breast
The wild-flowers who will stoop to
number '>
A few can touch the magic string.
And noisy fame is proud to win
them : —
Alas for those that never sing,
But die with all their music in
them !
Nay, grieve not for the dead alone
Whose song has told their hearts'
sad story, —
Weep for the voiceless, who have
known
The cross without the crown of
glory !
Not where Leucadian breezes sweep
O'er Sappho's memory-haiuited
billow.
But where the glistening night-dews
weep
On nameless Sorrow's churchyard
pillow.
HOLMES.
211
O hearts that break and give no sign
Save whitening lip and fading
tresses,
Till Death pours out his cordial wine
Slow-dropped from Misery's crush-
ing presses, —
If singing breath or echoing chord
To every hidden pang were given,
What endless melodies were poured,
As sad as earth, as sweet as heaven !
up-
DOEOTHY Q.
A FAMILY PORTRAIT.
Grandmother's mother: her age I
guess,
Thirteen summers, or something less ;
Girlish bust, but womanly air:
Smooth, square forehead ^\ith
rolled hair.
Lips that lover has never kissed ;
Taper fingers and slender wrist;
Hanging sleeves of stiff brocade ;
So they painted the little maid.
On her hand a parrot green
Sits unmoving and broods serene.
Hold up the canvas full in view, —
Look! there's a rent the light shines
through.
Dark with' a century's fringe of
dust, —
That was a Red-Coat's rapier-thrust!
Such is the tale the lady old,
Dorothy's daughter's daughter told.
Who the painter was none may tell,—
One whose best was not over well ;
Hard and dry, it must be confessed,
Flat as a rose that has long been
pressed :
Yet in her cheek the hues are bright,
Dainty colors of red and white,
And in her slender shape are seen
Hint and promise of stately mien.
Look not on her with eyes of scorn, —
Dorothy Q. was a lady l)orn !
Ay! since the galloping N'ormans
came,
England's annals have known her
name :
And still to the three-hilled rebel
town
Dear is that ancient name's renown,
For many a civic wreath they won.
The youthful sire and the gray-haired
son.
O Damsel Dorothy ! Dorothy Q. !
Strange is the gift that I owe to you;
Such a gift as never a king
Save to daughter or son might
bring.
All my tenure of heart and hand,
All my title to house and land ;
Mother and sister and child and wife
And joy and sorrow and death and
life!
^Vliat if a hundred years ago
Those close-shut lips had answered
No.
When forth the tremulous question
came
That cost the maiden her Norman
name.
And mider the folds that look so still
The bodice swelled with the bosom's
thrill ?
Should I be I, or would it be
One tenth another to nine-tenths me?
Soft is the breath of a maiden's Yes:
Not the light gossamer stirs with less;
But never a cable that holds so fast
Through all the battles of wa^'e and
blast,
And never an echo of speech or song
That lives in the babbling air so long!
There were tones in the voice that
whispered then
You may hear to-day in a hundred
men.
O lady and lover, how faint and far
Your images hover, — and here we
are.
Solid and stirring in flesh and bone, —
Edward's and Dorothy's — all their
own, —
A goodly record for time to show
Of a syllable spoken so long ago : —
Shall 1 bless you, Dorothy, or forgive
For the tender whisper that bade" me
live ?
278
HOLMES.
It shall be a blessing, my little maid !
I will heal the stab of the Red-Coat's
blade,
And freshen the gold of the tarnished
frame,
And gild with a rhyme your house-
hold name:
So you shall smile on us brave and
bright
As first you greeted the morning's
light,
And live untroubled by woes and
fears
Through a second youth of a hun-
dred years.
UNDER THE VIOLETS.
Hek hands are cold; her face is
white ;
No more her pulses come and go ;
Her eyes are shut to life and light; —
Fold the white vesture, snow on
snow.
And lay her where the violets blow.
But not beneath a graven stone,
To plead for tears with alien eyes;
A slender cross of wood alone
Shall say, that here a maiden lies.
In peace beneath the peaceful
skies.
And gray old trees of hugest limb
Shall wheel their circling shadows
round
To make the scorching sunlight dim
That drinks the greenness from the
ground,
And drop their dead leaves on her
mound.
When o'er their boughs the squirrels
ran.
And through their leaves the robins
call,
And ripening in the autumn sun.
The acorns and the chestnuts fall,
Doubt not that she will heed them
all.
For her the morning choir shall sing
Its matins from the branches high,
And every minstrel-voice of Spring,
That trills beneath the April sky,
Shall greet her with its earliest
cry. ■
^Vhen turning round their dial track,
Eastward the lengthening shadows
pass.
Her little mourners, clad in black,
The crickets, sliding through the
grass.
Shall pipe for her an evening mass.
At last the rootlets of the trees
Shall find the prison where she lies,
And bear the bviried dust they seize .
In leaves and blossoms to the skies
So may the soul that warmed it
rise!
If any, born of kindlier blood.
Should ask, What maiden lies be-
low ?
Say only this: A tender bud.
That tried to blossom in the snow,
Lies withered where the violets
blo\v.
NEARING THE SXOW-LIXE.
Slow toiling upward from the misty
vale,
I leave the bright enamelled zones
beloAv ;
No more for me their beauteous
bloom shall glow.
Their lingering sweetness load the
morning gale;
Few are the slender flowerets, scent-
less, pale.
That on their ice-clad stems, all
trembling blow
Along the margin of unmelting
snow ;
Yet with imsaddt ned voice thy verge
I hail.
mv's
m^
HOOD.
279
White realm of peace above the
flowering hne,
Welcome thy frozen domes, thy rocky
spires !
O'er thee undimmed the moon-girt
planets shine,
On thy majestic altars fade the fires
That tilled the air with smoke of vain
desires.
And all the unclouded blue of
heaven is thine !
THE TWO STIiEAMS.
Behold the rocky wall
That down its sloping sides
Pours the swift rain-drops, blending
as they fall,
In rushing river-tides !
Yon stream, whose sources run
Turned by a pebble's edge.
Is Athabasca, rolling towards the sun
Through the cleft mountain-ledge.
The slender rill had strayed.
But for the slanting stone.
To evening's ocean, with the tangled
braid
Of foam-flecked Oregon.
So from the heights of Will
Life's parting stream descends,
And, as a moment turns its slender
rill.
Each widening torrent bends, —
From the same cradle's side.
From the same mother's knee, —
One to long darkness and the frozen
tide,
One to the Peaceful Sea !
HYMX OF TRUST.
O Love Divine, that stoopedst to
share
Our sharpest pang, our bitterest
tear.
On Thee we cast each earth-born care,
We smile at pain while Thou art
near !
Though long the weary way we tread,
And sorrow crown each lingering
year,
No path we shun, no darkness dread,
Our hearts still whispering, Thou
art near!
When drooping pleasure turns to
grief,
And trembling faith is changed to
fear.
The murmuring wind, the quivering
leaf.
Shall softly tell us. Thou art near !
On Thee we fling our^iurdening woe,
O Love Divine, forever dear.
Content to suffer while we know.
Living and dying. Thou art near !
Thomas Hood.
MELA^CHOL Y.
[From the Ode thereon.]
Lo! here the best, the worst, the
world
Doth now remember or forget
Are in one common ruin hurled ;
And love and hate are calmly met —
The loveliest eyes that ever shone.
The fairest hands, and locks of jet.
Is 't not enough to vex our souls
And fill our eyes, that we liave set
Our love upon a rose's leaf.
Our hearts upon a violet ?
Blue eyes, red cheeks, are frailer yet;
And, sometimes, at their swift decay
Beforehand we must fret.
The roses bud and bloom again ;
But love may haunt the grave of love,
And watch the mould in vain.
280
HOOD.
O clasp me, sweet, whilst thou art
mine.
And do not take my tears amiss;
For tears luiist flow to wash away
A thought that shows so stern as
this.
Forgive, if somewhile I forget.
In woe to come, the present bliss,
As frighted Proserpine let fall
Her flowers at the sight of Dis.
E'en so the dark and bright will
kiss;
The sunniest things throw sternest
shade;
And there is even a happiness
Tliat makes the heart afraid!
Now let us witli a spell invoke
The full-orbed moon to grieve our
eyes;
Not bright, not bright — but with a
eloud
Lapped all about her, let her rise
All pale and dim, as if from rest.
The ghost of the late buried sun
Had crept into tlie skies.
The moon! she is the source of
sighs.
The very face to make us sad,
If but to think in other times
The same calm, quiet look she had,
As if the world held nothing liase,
Or vile and mean, or herce and
bad —
The same faij light that shone in
streams.
The fairy lamp that charmed the
lad;
For so it is, with spent delights
She taunts men's brains, and makes
them mad.
All things are touched with melan-
choly,
Born of the secret soul's mistrust
To feel her fair ethereal wings
Weighed down with vile, degraded
dust.
Even the bright extremes of joy
Bring on conclusions of disgust —
Like the sweet blossoms of the
May,
Whose fragrance ends in must.
Oh, give her then her tribute just,
Her sighs and tears, and musings
holy!
There is no music in the life
That sounds with idiot laughter
solely;
There "s not a string attimed to mirth,
But has its chord in melancholy.
rO A CHILD EMBRACING HIS
MOTHER.
Love thy mother, little one !
Kiss and clasp her neck again, —
Hereafter she may have a son
Will kiss and clasp her neck in vain.
Love thy mother, little one !
Gaze upon her living eyes.
And mirror back her lov(> for thee, —
Hereafter thou may'st shudder sighs
To meet tliem when they cannot see.
Gaze upon her living eyes I
Press her lips the while they glow
With love that they have often told.
Hereafter thoti mayest press in woe,
And kiss them till thine old are cold,
Press her lips the while they glow!
Oh, revere her raven hair !
Althotigh it be not silver-gray —
Too early Death, led on by fare.
May snatch save one dear lock away.
Oh! revere her raven hair!
Pray for her at eve and morn.
That Heaven may long the stroke
defer, —
For thou may'st live the hour forlorn
When thou wilt ask to die with her.
Pray for her at eve and morn !
/ REMEMBER, I REMEMBER.
I REMEMBEK, I remember
The house where I was born.
The little window where the stin
Came peeping in at morn ;
He never came a wink too soon;
HOOD.
281
Nor brought too long a day ;
But now, I often wish the night
Had borne my breath away !
I remember, I remember
The roses, red and white.
The violets, and the lily-cups —
Those flowers made of light!
The lilacs where the robin built
And where my brother set
The laburnum on his birthday, —
The tree is living yet!
I remember. I remember
Where I was used to swing.
And thought the air must rush as
fresii
To swallows on the wing;
]My spirit flew in feathers then.
That is so heavy now,
And summer pools could hardly cool
The fever on my brow !
I remember, I remember
The fir-trees dark and high;
I used to think their slender tops
Were close against the sky.
It was a childish ignorance,
But now 'tis little joy
To know I'm farther off from heaven
Than when I was a boy.
THE DEATH-BED.
We watched her breathing through
the night
Her breathing soft and low.
As in her breast the wave of life
Kept heaving to and fro.
So silently we seemed to speak,
So slowly moved about.
As we had lent her half our powers
To eke her living out.
Our very hopes belied our fears,
Our fears our hopes belied —
We thought her dying when she slept.
And sleeping when she died.
For when the morn came, dim and
sad.
And chill with early showers.
Her quiet eyelids closed — she had
Another morn than ours.
THE SONG OF THE SHIRT.
With fingers weaiy and worn,
With eyelids heavy and red,
A woman sat, in unwomanly rags,
Plying her needle and thread —
Stitch! stitch! stitch!
In poverty, hunger, and dirt;
And still with a voice of dolorous
pitch
She sang the " Song of the Shirt! "
■ ' Woi'k ! work ! work !
While the cock is crowing aloof I
And \\ork — work — work.
Till the stars shine through the
roof !
It's oh! to be a slave
Along with the barbarous Turk,
Where woman has never a soul to
save.
If this is Christian work!
' ' Work — work — work
Till the brain begins to swim !
Work — work — work
Till the eyes are heavy and dim!
Seam, and gusset, and band,
Band, and gusset, and seam —
Till over the buttons I fall asleep.
And sew them on in a dream I
•' O men, with sisters dear!
O men, with mothers and wives!
It is not linen you 're wearing out!
But human creatures' lives !
Stitch — stitch — stitch.
In poverty, hunger, and dirt —
Sewing at once, with a double thread,
A shroud as well as a shirt !
" But why do I talk of Death —
That phantom of grisly bone ?
I hardly fear his terrible shape.
It seems so like ray omu —
282
HOOD.
It seems so like my own
Because of the fasts I keep ;
O God ! that bread should be so dear,
And flesh and blood so cheap !
' ' Work — work — work !
My labor never flags ;
And what are its wages ? A bed of
straw,
A crust of bread, and rags.
That shattered roof, and this naked
floor;
A table, a broken chair;
And a wall so blank my shadow I
thank
For sometimes falling there !
" Work — work — work !
From weary chime to chime !
Work — work — work —
As prisoners Mork for crime !
Band, and gusset, and seam,
Seam, and gusset, and band —
Till the heart is sick and the brain
benumbed,
As well as the weary hand.
" Work — work — Avork
In the dull December light !
And work — work — work.
When the weather is warm and
bright ! —
While underneath the eaves
The brooding swallows cling.
As if to show me their sunny backs,
And twit me with the spring.
" O ! but to breathe the breath
Of the cowslip and primrose sweet —
With the sky above my head.
And the grass beneath my feet !
For only one short hour
To feel as I used to feel.
Before I knew the woes of want
And the walk that costs a meal !
"O! but for one short hour —
A respite however brief!
No blessed leisure for love or hope,
But only time for grief !
A little weeping would ease my heart ;
But in their briny bed
My tears must stop, for every drop
Hinders needle and thread! "
With fingers weary and worn,
With eyelids heavy and red,
A woman sat, in unwomanly rags,
Plying her needle and thread —
Stitch! stitch! stitch!
In poverty, hunger, and dirt ;
And still, with a voice of dolorous
pitch —
AVould that its tone could reach the
rich ! —
She sang this "Song of the Shirt!"
THE BRIDGE OF SIGHS.
Onk more unfortmiate,
Weary of breath,
Rashly importunate.
Gone to her death !
Take her up tenderly,
Lift her with care !
Fashioned so slenderly —
Young, and so fair!
Look at her garments
Clinging like cerements.
Whilst the wave constantly
Drips from her clothing;
Take her up instantly,
Loving, not loathing!
Touch her not scornfully !
Think of her moiu'nfully,
Gently and humanly —
Not of the stains of her;
All that remains of her
Now is pure womanly.
Make no deep scrutiny
Into her mutiny.
Rash and undutif ul ;
Past all dishonor,
Death has left on her
Only the beautifid.
Still, for all slips of hers,
One of Eve's family —
Wipe those poor lips of hers>
Oozing so clannnily.
Loop up her tresses
Escaped from the comb —
dw
HOOD.
283
Her fair auburn tresses —
Take her up tenderly —
Whilst wonderment guesses
Lift her with care !
Where was lier home "?
Fashioned so slenderly —
Young and so fair !
Who was her fatlier ?
Who was her motlier ?
Ere her limbs frigidly,
Had slie a sister ?
Stiffen too rigidly.
Had she a brotlier ?
Decently, kindly.
Or was tliere a dearer one
Smooth and compose them;
8till, and a nearer one
And her eyes, close them,
Yet, tlian all other ?
Staring so blindly !
Alas ! for the rarity
Dreadfully staring
Of Christian charity
Through muddy hnpurity,
Under the sun !
As when with the daring
Oh ! it was pitiful !
Last look of despairing
Near a whole city full,
Fixed on futurity.
Home she had none.
Perishing gloomily,
Sisterly, brotherly.
Spurred by contumely,
Fatherly, motherly
Cold inhumanity
Feelings had changed —
Burning insanity
Love, by harsh evidence,
Into her rest !
Thrown from its eminence ;
Cross her hands humbly,
Even God's providence
As if praying dumbly,
Seeming estranged.
Over her breast !
Where the lamps quiver
So far in the river,
W'ith many a light
From window and casement,
Owning her weakness.
Her evil behavior,
And leaving, with meekness,
Her sins to'her Saviour!
From garret to basement,
She stood with amazement.
Houseless by night.
FAREWELL, LIFE.'
The bleak wind of March
Made her tremble and shiver:
Faeewei.l, Life ! my senses swim,
But not the dark arch,
And the world is growing dim :
Or the black flowing river;
Thronging shadows cloud the light,
Mad from life's history.
Like the advent of the niglit —
Glad to death's mystery.
Colder, colder, colder stilt,
Swift to be hurled —
Upwards steals a vapor chill ;
Any where, any where
Strong the earthy odor grows —
Out of the world !
I smell the mould above the rose !
In she plunged boldly —
AVelcome, Life! the spirit strives:
No matter how coldly
Strength returns, and hope revives;
The rough river ran —
Cloudy fears and shapes forlorn
Over the brink of it !
Fly like shadows at the morn —
Picture it — think of it !
O'er the earth there comes a bloom;
Dissolute man!
Sunny light for sidlen gloom.
Lave in it, drink of it,
Warm perfume for vapor cold —
Then, if you can !
I smell the rose above the mould !
284
HOUGHTON.
BALLAD.
It was not in the winter
Our loving lot was cast;
It was the time of roses —
We plucked them as we passed !
That churlish season never frowned
On early lovers yet !
O, no — the Avorld was newly crowned
With flowers when first we met.
'T was twilight, and I bade you go —
But still you held me fast ;
It was the time of roses, —
We plucked them as we passed !
TRUE DEATH.
It is not death, that some time in a
sigh
This eloquent breath shall take its
speechless flight;
That some time these bright stars,
that now reply
In sunlight to the sun, shall set in
night;
That this warm conscious flesli shall
perish quite,
And all life's ruddy springs forget to
flow;
That thought shall cease, and the
immortal sprite
Be lapped in alien clay and laid be-
low;
It is not death to know this — but to
know
That pious thoughts, whicli visit at
new graves
In tender pilgrimage, will cease to go
So duly and so oft, — and when grass
waves
Over the i)ast-away, there may be
then
No resurrection in the minds of men.
LOVE BETTERED BY TIME.
Love, dearest lady, such as I would
speak.
Lives not within the humor of the
eye;
Not being but an outward phantasy
That skims the surface of a tinted
cheek, —
Else it Mould wane with beauty, and
grow weak.
As if the rose made sinnmer — and
so lie
Amongst the perishable things that
die.
Unlike the love which I would give
and seek ;
Whose health is of no hue — to feel
decay
With cheeks' decay, that have a rosy
prime.
Love is its own great loveliness al-
way.
And takes new beauties from the
touch of time ;
Its bough owns no December and no
May,
But bears its blossoms into Avinter's
clime.
George Houghton.
[From Tlic Legend of St. Olafs Kirk.']
VALROlia WATCHING AXEVS DEPARTURE.
At kirk knelt Valborg, the cold altar-stone
Reeling beneath her. Filled with choking grief
She could not say good-bye, but by a page
Her rosary sent him ; and when he had climbed
His horse, and on the far-off bridge she heard
HOUGHTON.
285
The dull tramp of his troopers, up she fared
By stair and ladder to old Steindor's post, —
Foi' he was mute, and could not nettle her
With words' cheap guise of sympathy. There perched
Beside him up among the dusty bells.
She pushed her face between the nuillions, looked
Across the world of snow, lighted like day
By moon and moor-ild ; saw with misty eyes
A gleam of steel, an eagle's feather tall;
And through the clear air watched it, tossing, pass
Across the sea-line ; saw the ship lift sail
And blow to southward, catching light and shade
As 'mong the sheers and skerries it picked out
A crooked pathway; saw it round the ness.
And, catching one last flicker of the moon,
Fade into nothingness. With desolate steps
She left the bellman and crept down the stairs ;
Heard all the air re-echoing : ' ' He is gone ! " —
Felt a great sob behind her lips, and tears
Flooding the sluices of her eyes ; turned toward
The empty town, and for the first time saw
That Nidaros was small and irksome, felt
First time her tether galling, and, by heaven !
Wished she'd been born a man-child, free to fare
Unhindered through the world's wide pastures, free
To stand this horn- with Axel as his squire.
And with him brave the sea-breeze. Aimlessly
She sought the scattered gold-threads that had formed
Life's glowing texture: but how dull they seemed!
How bootless the long waste of lagging weeks,
With dull do-over of mean drudgeries.
And miserable cheer of pitying mouths
Whistling and whipping through small roimd of change
Their cowering pack of saw and circumstance!
How slow the crutches of the limping years !
\_Slx Quatrains from Album-Leaves.']
COURAGE.
Dakkness before, all joy behind !
Yet keep thy courage, do not mind :
He soonest reads the lesson right
Who reads with back against the
lisht!
AMBiTioyr.
The palace with its splendid dome.
That nearest to the sky aspires.
Is first to challenge storms that roam
Above it, and call down their fires.
THIS XAME OF MIXE.
This name of mine the sim may steal
away,
Fierce fire consume it, moths eat
name and day ;
Or mildew's hand may smooch it with
decay. —
But not my love, for that shall live
alway.
REGRET.
I've regretted most sincerely,
I've repented deeply, long;
But to those I've loved most dearly,
I've oftenest done wrong.
PURITY.
Let yoixr truth stand sure,
xViid the world is true ;
Let your heart keep pure —
And the world will, too.
He erred, no doul)t, perhaps he
sinned ;
Shall I then dare to cast a stone ?
Perhaps this blotch, on a garment
white.
Counts less than the dingy robes I
own.
{From Albiim-Lcares.]
DAISY.
I GAVE my little girl back to the
daisies,
From them it was that she took her
name ;
I gave my precious one back to the
daisies,
From where they caught their color
she came;
And now, when I look in the face of
a daisy.
My little girl's face I see, I see!
My tears, down dropping, with theirs
commingle.
And they give my precious one
back to me.
Lord Houghton (Richard Monckton Milnes).
SIXCE YES TERDA Y.
I'm not where I was yesterday.
Though my home be still the same,
For I have lost the veriest friend
Whomever a friend could name ;
I'm not where I was yesterday.
Though change there be little to see,
For a part of myself has lapsed away
From Time to Eternity.
I have lost a thought that many a
year
Was most familiar food
To my inmost mind, by night or day.
In merry or plaintive mood ;
I have lost a hope, that many a year
Looked far on a gk^aming way.
When the walls of Life were closing
round.
And the sky was sombre gray.
I thought, how should I see him first,
How should our hands first meet.
Within his room, — upon the stair,—
At the corner of the street ?
I thought, where should I hear him
first,
How catch his greeting tone, —
And thus I went up io his door,
And they told me he was gone !
Oh ! what is Life but a sum of love,
And Death but to lose it all ?
Weeds be for those that are left be-
hind.
And not for those that fall !
And now how mighty a sum of love
Is lost for ever to me
No, I'm not what I was yesterday.
Though change there be little to see.
LABOR.
Heart of the people! Working men!
Marrow and nerve of human powers;
Who on your stm-dy backs sustain
Through streaming time this world
of ours ;
Hold by that title, — whicli pro-
claims,
That ye are undismayed and strong,
Accomplishing whatever aims
May to the sons of earth belong.
HOUGHTON.
287
And he who still and silent sits
In closed room or shady nook,
And seems to nurse his idle wits
AVith folded arms oroi^en book: —
To things now working in that mind,
Your children's children well may
owe
Blessings that hope has ne'er defined
Till from his busy thoughts they flow.
Thus all must work — with head or
hand,
For self or others, good or ill :
Life is ordained to bear, like land.
Some fruit, be fallow as it will ;
Evil has force itself to sow
Where we deny the healthy seed, —
And all our choice is this, — to grow
Pasture and grain or noisome weed.
Then in content possess your hearts,
Unenvious of each other's lot, —
For those which seem the easiest parts
Have travail which ye reckon not:
And lie is bravest, happiest, best.
Who. from the task within his span
Earns for himself his evening rest,
And an increase of good for man.
/ WAKDEnED BY THE BROOK-
SIDE.
I WANDERED by the brook-side,
I wandered by the mill, —
I could not hear the brook flow,
The noisy wheel was still ;
There was no burr of grasshopper.
No chirp of any bird. "
But the beating of my own heart
Was all the sound I heard.
I sat beneath the elm-tree,
I watched the long, long shade,
And as it grew still longer,
I did not feel afraid ;
For I listened for a footfall,
I listened for a word, —
But the beating of my own heart
Was all the sound I heard.
He came not, — no, he came not, —
The night came on alone, —
The little stars sat one by one.
Each on his golden throne ;
The evening air passed by my cheek,
The leaves above svere stirred ;
But the beating of my own heart
Was all the sound I heard.
Fast silent tears were flowing,
When something stood behind,
A hand was on my shoulder,
I knew its touch was kind:
It drew me nearer — nearer.
We did not speak one word ;
For the beating of our own hearts
Was all the sound we heard.
THE WORTH OF HOURS.
Believe not that your inner eye
Can ever in just measure try
The worth of hours as they go by :
For every man's weak self, alas!
Makes him to see them, while they
pass.
As through a dim or tinted glass :
But if in earnest care you would
Mete out to each its part of good.
Trust rather to your after-mood.
Those surely are not fairly spent.
That leave your spirit bowed and
bent
In sad unrest and ill-content :
And more, — though free from seem-
ing harm.
You rest from toil of mind or arm,
Or slow retire from Pleasure's
charm, —
If then a painful sense comes on
Of something wholly lost and gone,
Vainly enjoyed, or vainly done, —
Of something from your being's
chain,
Broke otf, nor to be linked again
By all mere memory can retain. —
HOUOHTON.
Upon yoiu' heart this truth may
rise, —
jSTotliing that altogether dies
Suffices man's just destinies:
So should we live, that every hour
May die as dies the natural flower, —
A self-reviving thing of power;
That every thought and every deed
May hold within itself the seed
Of future good and future need :
Esteeming sorrow, whose employ
Is to develop not destroy.
Far better than a barren joy.
FOREVER UNCONFESSED.
They seemed to those who saw them
meet
The worldly friends of every day,
Her smile was undisturbed and
sweet,
His coiu'tesy was free and gay.
But yet if one the other's name
In some unguarded moment heard.
The heart you thought so calm and
tame.
Would struggle like a captured bird :
And letters of mere formal phrase
Were blistered with repeated tears. —
And this was not the work of days.
But had gone on for years and
years
Alas, that Love was not too strong
For maiden shame and manly pride !
Alas, that they delayed too long
The goal of mutual bliss beside.
Tet what no chance could then re-
veal.
And neither would be first to own,
Let fate and courage now conceal,
When truth could bring remorse
alone.
DIVORCED.
We that were friends, yet are not
now,
AYe that must daily meet
AVith ready words and courteous
bow.
Acquaintance of the street;
We must not scorn the holy past,
We nuist remember still
To honor feelings that outlast
The reason and the will.
I Height reprove tliy broken faith,
I might recall the time
When thou wert chartered mine till
death.
Through every fate and clime ;
When every letter was a vow,
And fancy was not free
To dream of ended love; and thou
Wouldst say the same of me.
No, no, 'tis not for us to trim
The balance of our wrongs.
Enough to leave remorse to him
To whom remorse belongs!
Let our dead friendshii) be to us
A desecrated name,
LTnutterable, mysterious,
A sorrow and a shame.
A sorrow that two souls Mhich
grew
Encased in mutual bliss.
Should wander, callous strangers,
through
So cold a woi'ld as this !
A shame that we, whose hearts had
earned
For life an early heaven.
Should be like angels self-returned
To Death, when once forgiven!
Let us remain as living signs.
Where they that run may read
Pain and disgrace in many lines,
As of a loss indeed ;
That of our fellows any who
The prize of love have won
May tremble at the thought to do
The thing that we have done !
mf2
HOWE.
289
ALL THINGS ONCE ARE THINGS
FOR EVER.
All things oneo are things forever;
Soul, once living, lives for ever;
Bla]ne not \vliat is only once.
When tliat once endures for ever;
Love, once felt, though soon forgot
Moulds the heart to good for ever ;
Once betrayed from childly faith,
Man is conscious man for ever;
Once the void of life revealed,
It must dee^jen on for ever.
Unless God fill up the heart
Witli himself for once and ever:
Once made God and man at once,
God and man are one for ever.
Julia Ward Howe.
BATTLE HYMN OF THE REPUBLIC.
Mine eyes have seen the glory of the
coming of the Lord ;
He is tramiDling out the vintage where
the grapes of wrath are stored ;
He hath loosed the fateful lightning
of his terrible swift sword,
His trutli is marching on.
I have' seen him in the watch-fires of
a hundred circling camps;
They have builded him an altar in the
evening dews and damps ;
I can read his righteous sentence by
the dim and flaring lamps.
His day is marching on.
I have read a fiery gospel, writ in bui--
nished rows of steel:
"As ye deal with my contemners, so
with you my grace shall deal ;
Let the hero, born of woman, crush
the serpent with his heel.
Since God is marching on ! "
He has sounded forth the trumpet that
shall never call retreat ;
He is sifting out the hearts of men be-
fore his judgment-seat ;
Oh ! be swift, my soul, to answer him !
be jubilant, my feet !
Our God is marching on.
In the beauty of the lilies Christ was
born across the sea.
With a glory in his bosom that trans-
figures you and me ;
As he died to make men holy, let us
die to make men free,
While God is marching on !
[From Thouyhts in Pere la Chaise.]
IMAGINED REPLY OF E LOIS A TO
THE POET'S QUESTIONING.
' ' What was I cannot tell — thou
know' St our story.
Know' St how we stole God's treasure
from on high ;
Without heaven's virtue we had heav-
en's glory.
Too justly our delights were doomed
to die.
" Intense as were our blisses, e'en so
painful
The keen privation it was ours to
share ;
All states, all places barren proved
and baneful.
Dead stones grew pitiful at our de-
spair;
"Till, to the cloister's solitude re-
pairing.
Our feet the way of holier sorrows
trod ,
Hid from each other, yet together
sharing
The labor of the Providence of God.
290
HOWE.
" Often at midnight, on the cold stone
My passionate sobs have rent the pas-
sive air,
While iny crisped fingers clutched the
pavement, trying
To hold him fast, as he had still been
there.
" I called, I shrieked, till my spent
breath came faintly,
I sank, in pain Christ's martyrs could
not bear;
Then dreamed I saw him, beautiful
and saintly.
As his far convent tolled the hour of
prayer.
" Solemn and deep that vision of re-
union —
He passed in robe, and cowl, and san-
dall'd feet,
But ovu- dissever' d lips held no com-
munion.
Our long divorced glances could not
meet.
" Then slowly, from that hunger of
sensation.
That rage for happiness, which makes
it sin,
I rose to calmer, wider contemplation,
And knew the Holiest, and his disci-
pline.
''O thou who call' St on me! if that
thou bearest
A wounded heart beneath thy wom-
an's vest.
If thou my mournful earthly fortune
sharest.
Share the high hopes that calmed my
fever' d breast.
"Not vainly do I boast Eeligion's
power,
Faith dawned upon the eyes with Sor-
row dim ;
I toiled and trusted, till there came
an hovu
That saw me sleep in God, and wake
with him.
" Seek comfort thus, for all life's
painful losing.
Compel from Sorrow merit and re-
ward.
And sometimes wile a mournful hour
in musing
How Eloisa loved her Abelard."
The voice fled heav'nward ere its
spell was broken, —
I stretched a tremulous hand within
the grate.
And bore away a ravished rose, in
token
Of woman's highest love and hard-
est fate.
STANZAS FllOM THE " TRIBUTE
TO A SERVANT."
Oh! grief that wring' st mine eyes
with tears.
Demand not from my lips a song ;
That fated gift of early years
I've loved too well, I've nursed too
long.
Wliat boot my verses to the heart
That breath of mine no more shall
stir ?
Where were the piety of Art,
If thou wert silent over her ?
This was a maiden, light of foot,
Whose bloom and laughter, fresh and
free.
Flitted like sunshine, in and out
Among my little ones and me.
Hers was the poAver to quell and
charm ;
The ready wit that children love ;
The faithful breast, the shielding
arm
Pillowed in sleep my tenderest dove.
She played in all the nurseiy plays,
She ruled in all its little strife;
A thousand genial ways endeared
Her presence to my daily life.
She ranged my liair with gem or
flower.
Careful, the festal draperies hung,
Or plied her needle, horn- by hour
In cadence with the song 1 sung.
My highest joy she could not share,
Nor fathom sorrow's deep abyss;
For that, she wore a smiling air,
She hung her head and pined for this.
" And she shall live with me," I said,
" Till all my pretty ones be grown;
I'll give my girls my little maid,
The gayest thing I call my own."
Or else, methought, some farmer bold
Should woo and win my gentle Liz-
zie,
And I should stock her house four-
fold.
Be with her wedding blithely busy.
But lo! Consumption's spectral form
Sucks from her lips the flickering
breath ;
In these pale flowers, these tear-drops
warm,
I bring the momnif ul dower of Death.
I could but say, with faltering voice
And eyes that glanced aside to weep,
" Be strong in faith and hope, my
child;
He giveth his beloved sleep.
" And though thou walk the shadowy
vale.
Whose end we know not. He will aid ;
His rod and staff shall stay thy steps ; "
"I know it well," she smiled and said.
She knew it well, and knew yet more
My deepest hope, though unexprest,
The hope that God's appointed sleep
But heightens ravishment with rest.
My children, living flowers, shall come
And strew with seed this grave of
thine.
And bid the blushing growths of
spring
Thy dreary painted cross entwine.
Thus Faith, cast out of barren creeds,
Shall rest in emblems of her own;
Beauty, still springing from Decay,
The cross- wood budding to the crown.
THE DEAD CHRIST.
Take the dead Christ to my chamber,
The Christ I brought from Rome ;
Over all the tossing ocean.
He has reached his western home;
Bear him as in procession,
And lay him solemnly
Where, through weary night and
morning,
He shall bear me company.
The name I bear is other
Than than that I bore by birth,
And I've given life to children
Who'll grow and dwell on earth;
But the time comes swiftly towards
me
(jSJ"or do I bid it stay),
When the dead Christ will be more
to me
Than all I hold to-day.
Lay the dead Christ beside me.
Oh, press him on my heart,
I would hold him long and painfully
Till the weary tears should start;
Till the divine contagion
Heal me of self and sin,
And the cold weight press wholly
down
The pulse that chokes within.
Reproof and frost, they fret me.
Towards the free, the sunny lands.
From the chaos of existence
I stretch these feeble hands ;
And, penitential, kneeling,
Pray God would not be wroth.
Who gave not the strength of feeling.
And strength of labor both.
Thou'rt but a wooden carving.
Defaced of worms, and old ;
Yet more to me thou couldst not be
Wert thou all wrapt in gold •
292
HO WELLS.
Like the gem-bedizened baby
Wliicli, at tlie Twelftli-day noon,
They show t'roni tlie Ara Coeli's steps,
To a uierry dancing-tune.
I ask of tliee no wonders.
No changing white or red ;
I dream not thou art hving,
I love and prize tliee dead.
Tliat salutary deadness
I seek, through want and pain,
From which God's own high power
can bid
Oui" virtue rise again.
William Deane Howells.
THE MYSTERIES.
Once on my mother's breast, a child,
I crept,
Holding my breath ;
There, safe and sad, lay shuddering,
and wept
At the dark mystery of Death.
Weary and weak, and worn with all
unrest,
Spent with the strife. —
O motlier, let me weep upon thy
breast
At the sad mystery of Life !
THANKS GI VING.
Lord, for the erring thought
Not into evil wrought:
Lord, for the wicked will
Betrayed and baffled still :
For the heart from itself kept.
Our thanksgiving accept.
For ignorant hopes that were
Broken to our blind prayer:
For pain, death, sorrow, sent
Unto our chastisement :
For all loss of seeming good.
Quicken our gratitude.
convention:
He falters on the threshold.
She lingers on the stair;
Can it be that was his footstep ?
Can it be that she is there ?
Without is tender yearning.
And tender love is within ;
They can hear each other's heart-
beats.
But a wooden door is between.
the POET'S FRIENDS.
The robin sings in the elm ;
The cattle stand beneath
Sedate and grave with great brown
eyes
And fragrant meadow-breath.
They listen to the flattered bird.
The wise-looking, stupid things;
And they never understand a word
Of all the robin sings.
THE MULBERRIES.
On the Rialto Bridge we stand ;
The street ebbs under and makes
no sound ;
But, with bargains shrieked on every
hand.
The noisy market rings aromid.
" Mttlberries, fine mulberries, here! "'
A tuneful voice, — and light, light
measure ;
Though I hardly should coimt tliese
mulberries dear,
If I paid three times the price for
my pleasm-e.
HO WE LIS.
293
Brown hands splashed with mulberry
blood,
The basket wreathed with mulber-
ry leaves
Hiding the berries beneath them; —
good!
Let us take whatever the young
rogue gives.
For you know, old friend, I haven 't
eaten
A mulberry since the ignorant joy
Of anything sweet in the mouth could
sweeten
All this bitter world for a boy.
O. I mind the tree in the meadow
stood
By the road near the hill: where I
climbed aloof
On its branches, this side of the gir-
dled wood,
I could see the top of our cabin
roof.
And, looking westward, coidd sweep
the shores
Of the river where we used to swim,
Uniler the ghostly sycamores.
Haunting the waters smooth and
dim ;
And eastward athwart the pasture-
lot
And over the milk-white buck-
wheat field
I coidd see the stately elm, where I
shot
The first black squirrel I ever
killed.
And southward over the bottom-land
I could see the mellow breadth of
farm
From the river-shores to the hills
expand.
Clasped in the curving river's
arm.
In the fields we set our guileless
snares
For rabbits and i^igeons and wary
quails,
Content with vaguest feathers and
hairs
Fro7n doubtful wings and vanished
tails.
And in the blue siunmer afternoon
We used to sit in the mulberi^-tree ;
The breaths of wind that remem-
bered June
Shook the leaves and glittering
berries free;
And while we watched the wagons go
Across the river, along the road,
To the mill above, or the mill below,
With horses that stooped to the
heavy load,
We told old stories and made new
plans.
And felt our hearts gladden within
us again,
For we did not dream that this life of
a man's
Could ever be what we know as
men.
We sat so still that the woodpeckers
came
And pillaged the berries overhead;
From his log the chipmonk, waxen
tame,
Peered and listened to what we
said.
One of us long ago was carried
To his grave on the hill above the
tree ;
One is a farmer there, and married ;
One has wandered over the sea.
And, if you ask me. I hardly know
Wh other I'd be the- dead or the
clown, —
The clod above or the clay below. —
Or this listless dust by fortune
blown
To alien lands. For, however it is.
So little we keep with us in life ;
At best we win only victories,
Not peace, not peace, O friend, in
this strife.
294
HOW ITT.
But if I could turn from the long de-
feat
Of the httle successes once more,
and be
A boy, with the whole wide world
at my feet
Under the shade of the mulberry
tree, —
From the shame of tlie squandered
chances, the sleep
Of the will that cannot itself
awaken,
From the promise tlie future can
never keep.
From tlie fitful purposes vague and
shaken, —
Then, while the grasshopper simgout
shrill
In th(» grass beneath the blanching
thistle.
And the afternoon air, with a tender
thrill.
Harked to the quail's complaining
whistle, —
Ah me ! should I paint the morrows
again
In quite the colors so faint to-
day,
And with the imperial mulberry's
stain
Re-purple life's doublet of hodden-
gray ?
Know again the losses of disillu-
sion ?
For the sake of the hope, have the
old deceit ? —
In spite of the question's bitter in-
fusion.
Don't you find these nuilberries
over-sweet ?
All our atoms are clianged, they
say;
And the taste is so different since
then :
We live, but a world has passed
away.
With tlie years that perished to
make us men.
Mary Howitt.
THE BR O OM-FL O IV Eli.
Oh, the broom, the yellow broom !
The ancient poet sung it,
And dear it is on summer days
To lie at rest among it.
I know the realms where people say
Tlie flowers have not their fellow;
I know where they shine out like
suns,
Tlie crimson and the yellow.
I know where ladies live encliained
In luxury's silken fetters.
And flowers as bright as glittering
gems
Are used for written letters.
But ne'er was flower so fair as this.
In modern days or olden ;
It groweth on its nodding stem
Like to a garland golden.
And all about my mother's door
Shine out its glittering bushes.
And down the glen, where clear as
light
Tlie mountain-water gushes.
Take all tlie rest; but give me
this,
And the bird that nestles in it;
I love it, for it loves the broom —
The green and yellow linnet.
Well, call the rose the queen of flow-
ers,
And boast of that of Sharon,
Of lilies like to marble cups.
And the golden rod of xiaron ;
HO WITT.
295
I care not how these flowers may be
Beloved of man and Avoman ;
The broom it Is the flower for me,
That groweth on the conunon.
Oh, the broom, the yellow brpom!
The ancient poet sung it,
And dear it is on summer days
To lie and rest among it.
TIBBIE INGLIS.
Bonnie Tibbie Inglis!
Through sun and stormy weather,
She kept upon the broomy hills
Her father's flock together.
Sixteen summers had she seen, —
A rosebud just unsealing;
Without sorrow, without fear.
In her mountain shealing.
She was made for happy thoughts,
For playful wit and laughter;
Singing on the hills alone.
With echo singing after.
She had hair as deeply black
As the cloud of thunder;
She had brows so beautiful.
And dark eyes flashing under.
Bright and witty shepherd girl,
Beside a mountain water,
I found her, whom a king himself
Would proudly call his daughter.
She was sitting 'niong the crags.
Wild and mossed and hoary,
Reading in an ancient book
Some old martyr story.
Tears were starting to her eyes,
Solemn thought was o'er her;
When she saw in that lone place
A stranger stand before her.
Crimson was her sunny cheek,
And lier lips seemed moving
With the beatings of her lieart; —
How could I help loving ?
On a crag I sat me down.
Upon the mountain hoary,
And made her read again to me
That old pathetic story.
Then she sang me mountain songs,
Till the air was ringing
With her clear and warbling voiee,
Like a skylark singing.
And when eve came on at length,
Among the blooming heather,
"We herded on the mountain-side
Her father's flock together.
And near unto her father's house
I said " Good night ! " with sorrow,
And inly wished that I might say,
" We'll meet again to-morrow."
I watched her tripping to her home ;
I saw her meet her mother ;
'' Among a thousand maids," I cried,
" There is not such another! "
I wandered to my scholar's home,
It lonesome looked and dreary;
I took my books, but could not read,
Methought that I was weary.
I laid me down upon my bed.
My heart with sadness laden ;
I dreamed but of the mountain world.
And of the moimtain maiden.
I saw her of the ancient book
The pages turning slowly ;
I saw her lovely crimson cheek
And dark eyes drooping lowly.
The dream was like the day's delight,
A life of pain's o'erpayment:
I rose, and with unwonted care,
Put on my Sabbath raiment.
To none I told my secret thoughts.
Not even to my mother,
Nor to the friend who, from my youth,
Was dear as is a brother.
I got me to the hills again;
The little flock was feeding:
And there young Tibbie Inglis sat.
But not the old book reading.
She sat as if absorbing thought
With heavy spells had bound her,
As silent as the mossy crags
Upon the mountains round her.
I thought not of my Sabbath dress ;
I thought not of my learning:
I thouglit but of the gentle maid
Who, 1 believed, was mourning.
Bonnie Tibbie Inglis!
How her beauty brightened
Looking at me, half-abashed,
With eyes that flamed and light-
ened !
There was no sorrow, then I saw,
There was no thought of sadness :
life! what after-joy hast thou
Like love's first certain gladness?
1 sat me down among the crags.
Upon the moinitain hoary;
But read not then the ancient book, —
Love was our pleasant story.
And then she sang me songs again.
Old songs of love and sorrow :
For our sufficient happiness
Great charms from woe could bor-
row.
And many hours we talked in joy.
Yet too much blessed for laughter:
I was a bappy man that day.
And happy ever after !
William Howitt.
DEPARTURE OF THE SWALLOW.
And is the swallow gone ?
Who beheld it ?
Which way sailed it ?
Farewell bade it none ?
No mortal saw it go: —
But who doth hear
Its summer cheer
As it flitteth to and fro ?
So the freed spirit flies !
From its surrounding clay-
It steals away
Like the swallow from the skies.
Whither ? wherefore doth it go ?
'Tis all unknown;
AVe feel alone
What a void is left below.
Ralph Hoyt.
OLD.
By the wayside, on a mossy stone.
Sat a hoary pilgrim sadly mus-
ing;
Oft I marked him sitting there
alone.
All the landscape like a page perus-
ing;
Poor, unknown —
By the wayside, on a mossy stone.
Buckled knee and shoe, and broad-
rimmed hat;
Coat as ancient as the form 'twas
folding;
Silver buttons, queue, and crimpt
cravat ;
Oaken staff, liis feeble hand up-
holding —
There he sat !
Buckled knee and shoe, and broad-
rimmed hat.
HOYT.
297
Seemed it pitiful he should sit there,
No one sympathizing, no one heed-
ing —
None to love him for his thin gray
hair.
And the furrows all so mutely
pleading
Age and care —
Seemed it pitiful he should sit there.
It was summer, and we went to
school —
Dapper coimtry lads, and little
maidens ;
Taught the motto of the "Dunce's
stool,"
Its grave import still my fancy
ladens —
" Here's a fool!"
It was summer, and we went to
school.
Wlien the stranger seemed to mark
our play.
Some of us were joyous, some sad-
hearted ;
I remember well — too well that day !
Oftentimes the tears unbidden
started.
Would not stay,
Wlien the stranger seemed to mark
our play.
One sweet spirit broke the silent
spell —
Ah, to me her name was always
heaven !
She besought him all his grief to tell,
(I was then thirteen, and she
eleven,) —
Isabel !
One sweet spirit broke the silent
spell.
"Angel," said he sadly, "I am old —
Earthly hope no longer hath a
morrow ;
Yet why I sit here thou shalt be
told,"
Then his eye betrayed a pearl of sor-
row;
Down it rolled.
" Angel," said he sadly. " I am old!
' ' I have tottered here to look once
more
On the pleasant scene where I de-
lighted
In the careless happy days of yore,
Ere the garden of my heart was
blighted
To the core —
I have tottered here to look once
more !
' ' All the picture now to me how
dear !
E'en this gray old rock where I am
seated
Is a jewel worth my journey here ;
Ah, that such a scene must be
completed
With a tear!
All the picture now to me how dear !
"Old stone school-house! — it is still
the same !
There's the very step I so oft
mounted ;
There's the window creaking in its
frame,
And the notches that I cut and
counted
For the game ;
Old stone school-house! — it is still
the same !
" In the cottage yonder, I was born;
Long my happy home — that hum-
ble dwelling;
There the fields of clover, wheat, and
corn —
There the spring, with limpid nec-
tar swelling";
Ah, forlorn!
In the cottage yonder, I was born.
' ' Those two gateway sycamores you
see
Then were planted just so far
as under
That long well-pole from the path to
free,
And the wagon to pass safely under ;
Ninety-three !
Those two gateway sycamores you
see.
298
IIOYT.
" There's the orchard where we used
to climb
When my mates and I were boys
together —
Thinking nothing of tlie fliglit of
time,
Fearing nauglit but work and rainy
weatlier;
Past its prime !
There's tlie orcliard where we used to
cUmb !
"There tlie rude, three-cornered
chestnut rails,
Eound the pasture where the flocks
were grazing.
Where, so sly, I used to watch for
quails
In the crops of buckwheat we were
raising —
Traps and trails ;
There the rude, three-cornered chest-
nut rails.
" There's the mill that ground our yel-
low grain —
Pond, and river, still serenely flow-
ing;
Cot, there nestling in the shaded
lane
Where the lily of my heart was
blowing —
Mary Jane!
There's the mill tliat ground our yel-
low grain !
" There's the gate on which I used to
swing —
Brook, and bridge, and barn, and
old red stable ;
But alas! no more the morn shall
bring
That dear group around my father's
table —
Taken wing!
There's the gate on which I used to
swing
"I am fleeing — all I loved have
fled.
Yon green meadow was oiu' place
for playing;
That old tree can tell of sweet things
said
When around it Jane and I were
straying —
She is dead !
I am fleeing — all I loved have fled.
• ■ Yon white spire, a pencil on the sky.
Tracing silently life's changeful
story,
So familiar to my dim old eye.
Points me to seven that are now in
glory
There on high —
Yon white spire, a pencil on the sky !
" Oft the aisle of that old church we
trod.
Guided thither by an angel mother;
Now she sleeps beneath its sacred sod ;
Sire and sisters, and my little
brother
Gone to God !
Oft the aisle of that old church we
trod.
'• There 1 heard of wisdom's pleasant
ways —
Bless the holy lesson ! — but, ah !
never
Shall I hear again those songs of
praise.
Those sweet voices — silent now
forever!
Peaceful days!
There I heard of wisdom's pleasant
ways.
' ' Tliere my Mary blessed me with her
hand
When our souls drank in the nup-
tial blessing,
Ere she hastened to the spirit-land —
Yonder turf her gentle bosom
pressing;
Broken band !
There my Mai^ blessed me with her
hand.
' • I have come to see that grave once
more.
And the sacred place where we de-
lighted.
HUNT.
299
Where we worshipped, in the days of
yore,
Ere the garden of my heart was
blighted
To tlie core ;
I have come to see tliat grave once
more.
"Angel," said he sadly, " I am old —
Earthly hope no longer hath a
morrow ;
Now why I sit here thou hast been
told,"
In his eye another pearl of sorrow ;
Down it rolled !
"Angel," said he sadly, "I am old!
By the wayside, on a mossy stone.
Sat the hoary pilgrim sadly nuis-
ing;
Still I marked him sitting there
alone.
All the landscape like a page
perusing —
Poor, unknown.
By the wayside, on a mossy stone.
Leigh Hunt.
ABOU BEN ADHEM.
Abou Ben Adhem (may his tribe in-
crease!)
Awoke one night from a deep dream
of peace.
And saw within the moonlight in
his room.
Making it rich and like a lily in
bloom.
An angel writing in a book of gold :
Exceeding peace had made Ben Ad-
hem bold.
And to the presence in the room he
said,
"What writest thou?" The vision
raised its head.
And, with a look made of all sweet
accord.
Answered. " The names of those who
love the Lord."
" And, is mine one?" said Abou.
" Nay, not so,"
Replied the angel. Abou spoke more
low.
But cheerly still ; and said, "I pray
thee, then.
Write me as one that loves his fellow-
men."
The angel wrote, and vanished. The
next night
It came again, with a great wakening
light.
And showed the names whom love of
God had blessed, —
And, lo! Ben Adhem's name led all
rest !
STANZAS FROM SONG OF THE
FLOWERS.
We are the sweet flowers.
Born of sunny showers,
(Think, whene'er you see us what our
beauty saith;)
Utterance, mute and bright.
Of some xmknown delight.
We fill the air with pleasau'e by our
simple breath:
All who see us love us —
We befit all i^laces,
Unto sorrow we give smiles — and
unto graces, graces.
Mark our ways, how noiseless
All, and sweetly voiceless.
Though the March winds pipe to make
our passage clear;
Not a whisper tells
Where our small seed dwells
Nor is known the moment green when
our tips appear.
We thread the earth in silence
In silence build our bowers —
And leaf by leaf in silence show, till
we laugh a-top, sweet flowers!
3U0
HUNT.
See (and scorn all duller
Taste) how Heaven loves color;
How great Nature, clearly, joys in red
and green;
What sweet thoughts she thinks
Of violets and pinks,
And a thousand flushing hues made
solely to be seen :
See her whitest lilies
Chill the silver showers,
And what a red mouth is her rose,
the woman of the flowers.
Uselessness divinest.
Of a use the finest,
Painteth us, the teachers of the end
of use ;
Travellers, weary-eyed,
Bless us, far and wide ;
Unto sick and prisoned thoughts we
give sudden truce:
Not a poor town window
Loves its sickliest planting,
But its wall s])eaks loftier truth than
Babylonian vaunting.
Sagest yet the uses
Mixed with our sweet juices.
Whether man or May-fly profit of the
balm ;
As fair fingers healed
Knights from the olden field.
We hold cups of mightiest force to
give the wildest calm.
Even the terror, poison,
Hath its plea for blooming;
Life it gives to reverent lips, though
death to the presuming.
Think of all these treasures,
Matchless works and pleasures
Every one a marvel, more than
thought can say ;
Then think in what bright show-
ers
We thicken fields and bowei's.
And with what heaps of sweetness
half stifle wanton May:
Think of the mossy forests
By the bee-birds haunted.
And all those Amazonian plains lone
lying as enchanted.
Trees themselves are ours :
Fruits are born of flowers;
Peach and roughest nut were blos-
soms in the spring;
Tlie lusty bee knows well
The news, and comes pell-mell,
And dances in the gloomy thicks with
darksome antheming;
Beneatli the very burden
Of planet-pressing ocean.
We wash our smiling cheeks in peace
— a thought for meek devotion.
Who shall say that flowers
Dress not heaven's own bowers ?
Who its love, without us, can fancy —
or sweet floor ?
Who shall even dare
To say we sprang not there —
And came not down, that Love might
bring one piece of heaven the
more ?
Oh ! pray believe that angels
From those blue dominions
Brought us in their white laps dowTi,
■ twixt their golden pinions.
THE GRASSHOPPER AND
CRICKET.
Green little vaulter in the sunny
grass.
Catching your heart up at the feel of
June, —
Sole voice that's heard amid the lazy
noon,
When even the bees lag at the sum-
moning brass ;
And you, warm little housekeeper,
who class
With those who think the candles
come too soon,
Loving the fire, and with your trick-
some tune
Nick the glad silent moments as they
pass !
O sweet and tiny cousins that be-
long.
One to the fields, the other to the
hearth.
'm
INGE LOW.
301
Both have your sunshine ; both,
though small, are strong
At your clear hearts ; and both seem
given to earth
To sing in thouglitful ears this nat-
ural song, —
In doors and out, summer and winter,
mirth.
MAY AND THE POETS.
There is May in books forever;
May will part from Spenser never;
May's in Milton, May's in Prior,
May's in Chaucer, Thomson, Dyer;
May's in all the Italian books: —
She has old and modern nooks,
Where she sleeps with nymplis and
elves.
In happy places they call shelves.
And will rise and dress your rooms
With a drapery tliick with blooms.
Come, ye rains, then if ye will.
May's at home, and with me still;
But come rather, thou, good weather.
And find us in the fields together.
I)EA TH.
Death is a road our dearest friends
have gone ;
Why with such leaders, fear to say,
" Lead on ? "
Its gate repels, lest it too soon be
tried.
But turns in balm on the immortal
side.
Mothers have ijassed it : fathers, chil-
dren; men
Whose like we look not to behold
again ;
Women that smiled away their lov-
ing breath ;
Soft is tlie travelling on the road to
death !
But guilt has passed it ? men not fit to
die ?
Oh, hush — for He that made us all
is by!
Human we're all — all men, all born
of mothers ;
All our own selves in the worn-out
shape of others ;
Our used, and oh, be sure, not to be
iii-used brothers !
Jean Ingelow.
SONGS OF SEVEN.
SEVEN TIMES ONE. — EXULTATION.
There's no dew left on the daisies and clover,
There's no rain left in heaven;
I've said my " seven times " over and over,
Seven times one are seven.
I am old, so old, I can write a letter;
My birthday lessons are done :
The lambs play always, they know no better;
They are only one times one.
O moon ! in the night I have seen you sailing
And shininir so round and low;
You were briglit! ah, bright! but your light is failing, -
You are nothing now but a bow.
302
IN O FLOW.
You moon, have you done something wrong in heaven
That God has hidden your face ?
I hope if you have, you will soon he forgiven,
And shine again in your place.
O velvet bee, you're a dusty fellow.
You've powdered your legs with gold!
O brave marsh marybuds, rich and yellow,
Give nie your money to hold !
O columbine, open your folded wrapper.
Where two twin turtle-doves dwell ?
cuckoopint, toll me the purple clapper
That hangs in your clear green bell !
And show me yoiu- nest with the young ones in it ;
I will not steal them away;
1 am old ! you may trust me, linnet, linnet, —
I am seven times one to-day.
SEVEN TIMES TWO. — IJOMANCE.
You bells in the steeple, ring, ring out your changes,
How many soever they be,
And let the brown meadow-lark's note as he ranges
Come over, come over to me.
Yet birds' clearest carol by fall or by swelling
No magical sense conveys,
And bells have forgotten their old art of telling
Tlie fortune of future days.
" Turn again, turn again," once they rang cheerily,
While a boy listened alone;
Made his heart yearn again, musing so wearily
All by himself on a stone.
Poor bells ! I forgive you ; your good days are over,
And mine, they are yet to be ;
No listening, no longing shall aught, aught discover
You leave the stoiy to me.
The foxglove shoots out of the green matted heather
Preparing her hoods of snow ;
She was idle, and slept till the sunshiny weather :
Oh I children take long to grow.
1 wish and I wish that the spring would go faster,
Nor long summer bide so late ;
And I could grow on like the foxglove and aster,
For some things are ill to wait.
I wait for the day when dear hearts shall discover,
While dear hands are laid on my head;
" Tlie child is a woman, the book may close over,
For all the lessons are said."
INGE LOW.
303
I wait for my story, — the birds cannot sing it,
Not one, as lie sits on the tree ;
The bells cannot ring it, but long years, oh, bring it!
Such as I wish it to be.
SEVEX TIMES THREE. — LOVE.
I leaned out of window, I smelt the white clover.
Dark, dark was the garden, I saw not the gate ;
" Now, if there be footsteps, he comes, my one lover, —
Hush, nightingale, hush ! O sweet nightingale, wait
Till I listen and hear
If a step draweth near.
For my lo\ e he is late !
" The skies in the darkness stoop nearer and nearer,
A cluster of stars hangs like fruit in the tree.
The fall of the water comes sweeter, comes clearer:
To what art thou listening, and what dost thou see ?
Let the star-clusters grow.
Let the sweet waters flow.
And cross quickly to me.
" You night-moths that hover where honey brims over
From sycamore blossoms, or settle or sleep ;
You glowworms, shine out, and the pathway discover
Tohim that comes darkling along the rough steep.
All, my sailor, make haste,
For the time runs to waste,
And my love lieth deep, —
" Too deep for swift telling; and yet, my one lover,
I've conned thee an answer, it waits thee to-night."
By the sycamore passed he, and through the white clover,
Then all the sweet speech I had fashioned took flight ;
But I'll love him more, more
Than e'er wife loved before.
Be the days dark or bright.
SEVEN TIMES FOUR. — MATERNITY.
Heigh-ho! daisies and buttercups!
Fair yellow daffodils, stately and tall !
When the wind wakes how they rock in the grasses.
And dance with the cuckoo-buds slender and small !
Here's two bonny boys, and here's mother's own lasses,
Eager to gather them all.
Heigh-ho ! daisies and buttercups ;
Mother shall thread them a daisy chain ;
Sing them a song of the pretty hedge-sparrow.
That loved her brown little ones, loved them full fain;
Sing, " Heart, thou art wide though the house be but narrow,
Sing once, and sing it again.
INGE LOW.
ao5
SEVEN TIMES SIX. — GIVING IN MAEKIAGE.
To bear, to nurse, to rear.
To watch, and then to lose :
To see my bric^ht ones disappear,
Drawn \\\) like morning dews, —
To bear, to nurse, to rear.
To watch, and then to lose:
This have I done when God drew near
Among his own to choose.
To hear, to heed, to wed,
And with thy lord depart
In tears that he, as soon as shed,
Will let no longer smart, —
To hear, to heed, to wed.
This while thou didst I smiled.
For now it was not God who said,
" Mother, give me thy child."
O fond, O fool, and blind!
To (iod I gave with tears ;
But when a man like grace would find,
My soul put by her fears, —
O fond, O fool, and blind'.
God guards in happier spheres ;
That man will guard where he did bind
Is hope for unknown years.
To hear, to heed, to wed.
Fair lot that maidens choose.
Thy mother's tenderest words are said,
Thy face no more she views;
Thy mother's lot, my dear.
She doth in naught accuse ;
Her lot to bear, to nurse, to rear,
To love, — and then to lose.
SEVEN TIMES SEVEN.
LONGIN/mion.]
liEA UTY'S IMMOnTALITY.
A THING of beauty is a joy forever:
Its loveliness increases; it will never
Pass into nothingness; but still will
keep
A bower quiet for us, and a sleep
Full of sweet dreams, and health, and
quiet breathing.
Therefore, on every morrow, are we
wreathing
A flowery band to bind us to the
earth.
Spite of despondence, of the inhuman
dearth
pf noble natures, of the gloomy days,
Of all the unhealthy and o'er-dark-
ened ways
Made for our searching: yes, in spite
of all.
Some shape of beauty moves away
the pall
From our dark spirits. Such the sun,
the moon.
Trees old and young, sprouting a
shady boon (dils
For simple sheep; and such are daffo-
With the green world they live in;
and clear rills
That for themselves a cooling covert
make
'Gainst the hot season ; the mid-forest
brake.
Rich with a sprinkling of fair musk-
rose blooms :
And such too is the grandeur of the
dooms
We have imagined for the mighty
dead ;
All lovely tales that we have heard or
read :
An endless fountain of innnortal
drink.
Pouring unto us from the heaven's
brink.
ODE TO A XIGHTIXGALE.
My heart aches, and a drowsy numb-
ness pains
My sense, as though of hemlock I
had drunk.
KEATS.
313
Or emptied some dull opiate to the
drains
One minute past, and Lethe-wards
had sunk:
'Tis not througli envy of thy happy
lot,
But heing too happy in tliy happi-
ness. —
That tliou, Uglit-winged Dryad of
tlie trees.
In some melodious plot
Of beechen green, and sliadows num-
berless,
Singest of s«nnner in full-throated
ease.
Oh, for a draught of vintage, that
hath been
Cooled a long age in the deep-
delved earth.
Tasting of Flora and the country-
green.
Dance, and Provencal song, and
sunburnt mirth !
Oh, for a beaker full of the warm
South !
Full of the true, the blushful Hip-
pocrene.
"With beaded bubbles winking at
the biini,
And purple-stained mouth ;
That I might drink, and leave the
world unseen.
And with thee fade away into the
forest dim!
Fade far away, dissolve, and quite
forget
What fhou among the leaves hast
never known.
The weariness, the fever, and the fret
Here, where men sit and hear each
other groan ;
Where palsy shakes a few, sad, last
gray hairs.
Where youth grows pale, and spec-
tre-thin, and dies;
Where but to think is to be full of
sorrow
And leaden-eyed despairs;
Where beauty cannot keep her lus-
trous eyes.
Or new Love pine at them beyond
to-morrow.
Away ! away ! for I will fly to thee,
Not charioted by Bacchus and his
pards,
But on the viewless wings of poesy,
Though the dull brain perplexes
and retards:
Already with thee! tender is the
night.
And haply the Queen-Moon is on
her throne, [fays;
Clustered around by all her starry
But here there is no light.
Save what from heaven is M'ith the
breezes blown
Through verdurous glooms and
winding mossy ways.
I cannot see what flowers are at my
feet.
Nor what soft incense hangs upon
the boughs.
But, in embalmed darkness, guess
each sweet
Wherewith the seasonable month
endows
The grass, the thicket, and the fruit-
tree wild ;
White hawthorn, and the pastoral
eglantine;
Fast-fading violets covered up in
leaves ;
And mid-May's eldest child.
The coming musk-rose, full of dewj
wine.
The murmurous haunt of flies on
summer eves.
Darkling I listen; and for many a
time
I have been half in love with ease-
ful Death,
Called him soft names in many a
mused rliyme,
To take into the air my quiet
breath; [die.
Now more than ever seems it rich to
To cease upon the midnight with
no pain.
While thou art pouring forth thy
soul abroad
In such an ecstasy!
Still wouldst thou sing, and 1 have
ears in vain. —
To thy high requiem become a sod.
314
KEBLE.
Tliou wast not born for death, im-
mortal bird !
No himgry generations tread thee
down ;
The voice 1 liear tliis passing niglit
was lieai'd
In ancient days by emperor and
clown :
Perhaps the self-same song that
found a path
Through the sad heart of Ruth,
when sick for home
She stood in tears amid the alien
corn ;
The same that oft-times hath
Charmed magic casements, opening
on the foam
Of perilous seas, in faeiy lands for-
lorn.
Forlorn ! the very word is like a bell
To toll me back from thee to my
sole self !
Adieu! the fancy cannot cheat so
well
As she is famed to do, deceiving
elf.
Adieu ! adieu ! thy plaintive anthem
fades
Past the near meadows, over the
still stream.
Up the hill-side; and now 'tis
buried deep
In the next valley-glades :
Was it a vision, or a waking dream ?
Fled is that music : — do I wake or
sleep ?
OJST READING CHAPMAN'S HOMER.
Much have I travelled in the realms
of gold,
xind many goodly states and king-
doms seen ;
Round many western islands have
I been «
Which bards in fealty to Apollo hold.
Oft of one wide expanse had I been
told
That deep-browed Homer ruled as
his demesne :
Yet did I never breathe its pure
serene
Till I heard Chapman speak out loud
and bold:
Then felt I like some watcher of the
skies
When a new planet swims into his
ken;
Or like stout Cortez when with eagle
eyes
He stared at the Pacific, — and all
his men
Looked at each other with a wild
surmise, —
Silent, upon a peak in Darien.
John Keble.
WHERE IS THY FAVORED HAUNT?
Where is thy favored haunt, eter-
nal voice.
The region of thy choice.
Where undisturbed by sin and earth,
the soul
Owns thy entire control ?
'Tis on the mountain's siunmit dark
and high,
When storms are hurrying by :
'Tis 'mid the strong foundations of
the earth.
Where torrents have their birth.
Xo sounds of worldly toil ascending
there,
Mar the full burst of prayer;
Lone Natiu'e feels that she may free-
ly breathe.
And round us and beneath
Are heard her sacred tones: the fit-
fid sweep
Of Winds across the steep,
Through withered bents — romantic
note and clear.
Meet for a hermit's ear, —
KEBLE.
315
The wheeling kite's wild solitary
cry,
And scarcely heard so liigh,
The dashing waters when the air is
still.
From many a torrent rill
That winds nnseen beneath the
shaggy fell.
Tracked by the blue mist well :
Such sounds as make deep silence in
the heart,
For Thought to do her part.
'Tis then we hear the voice of God
within.
Pleading with care and sin ;
" Child of my love! how have 1 wear-
ied thee ?
Why wilt thou err from me ?
Have I not brought thee from the
house of slaves ;
Parted the drowning waves,
And sent my saints before thee in
the way,
Lest thou should' St faint or
stray >
" What was the promise made to thee
alone ?
Art thou the excepted one ?
An heir of glory without grief or
pain '?
O vision false and vain!
There lies thy cross; beneath it
meekly bow,
It fits thy stature now:
Who scornful pass it with averted
eye,
'Twill crush them by and by.
" Raise thy repining eyes, and take
true measure
Of thine eternal treasure ;
The father of tliy Lord can grudge
thee nought,
The world for thee was bought,
And as this landscape broad — earth,
sea. and sky, —
All centres in thine eye.
So all (4od does if rightly rnider-
stood.
Shall work thy final good."
WHY SHOULD WE FAINT AND
FEAH TO LIVE ALONE?
Why should we faint anil fear to
live alone,
Since all alone, so heaven has
willed, we die ?
Xot even the tenderest heart, and
next our own.
Knows half the reasons why we
smile and sigh.
Each in his hidden sphere of joy or
woe
Our hermit spirits dwell, and range
apart.
Our eyes see all around in gloom or
glow —
Hues of their own, fresh borrowed
from the heart.
And well it is for us our God should
feel
Alone our secret throbbings : so om-
prayer
May readier spring to heaven, nor
spend its zeal
On cloud-born idols of this lower
air.
For if one heart in perfect sympathy
Beat with another, answering love
for love.
Weak mortals all entranced on earth
would lie ;
Xor listen for those purer strains
above.
Or what if heaven for once its search-
ing light [all
Lent to some partial eye. disclosing
The rude bad thoughts, that in our
bosom's night
Wander at large, nor heed Love's
gentle thrall ?
Who would not shun the dreary un-
couth place ?
As if, fond leaning where her in-
fant slept,
A mother's arm a serpent should em-
brace :
So miglit we friendless live, and
die unwept.
316
KEBLE.
Then keep the softening veil in mer-
cy drawn,
Thou who canst love us, though
thou read us true.
As on the bosom of the aerial lawn
Melts in dim haze each coarse un-
gentle hue.
So too may soothing hope thy leave
enjoy
Sweet visions of long severed
hearts to frame :
Though absence may impair, or cares
annoy,
Some constant mind may draw us
still the same.
SINCE ALL THAT IS NOT HEAVEN
MUST FADE.
Since all that is not heaven must
fade,
Liglit be the hand of ruin laid
Upon the home I love:
With lulling spell let soft decay
Steal on, and spare the giant sway,
The crash of tower aiid grove.
Far opening down some woodland
deep
In their own quiet dale should sleep
The relics dear to thought.
And wild-flower wreaths from side to
side
Their waving tracery hang, to hide
What ruthless time has wrought.
Such are the visions green and
sweet
That o'er the wistful fancy fleet
In Asia's sea-like plain.
Where slowly, round his isles of
sand,
Euphrates throiTgh the lonely land
Winds toward the pearly main.
Slumber is there, but not of rest;
There her forlorn and weary nest
The famished liawk has found.
The wild dog howls at fall of night,
The serpent's rustling coils affright
The traveller on his round. I
What shapeless form, half lost on
high.
Half seen against the evening sky,
Seems like a ghost to glitle.
And watch from Babel's crumbling
heap.
Where in her shadow, fast asleep,
Lies fallen imperial pride ?
With half-closed eye a lion there
Is basking in his noontide lair
Or prowls in twilight gloom.
The golden city's king he seems.
Such as in old prophetic dreams
Sprang from rough ocean's womb.
But where are now his eagle wings,
That sheltered erst a thoiisand kings,
Hiding the glorious sky
From half the nations, till they own
No holier name, no mightier throne ?
That vision is gone by.
Quenched is the golden statue's ray.
The breath of heaven has blown
away
What toiling earth had piled,
Scattering wise heart and crafty
hand.
As breezes strew on ocean's sand.
The fabrics of a child.
Divided thence through every age
Thy rebels, Ijord, their warfare wage,
And hoarse and jarring all
Mount up their heaven-assailing cries
To thy bright watchman in the skies
From Babel's shattered wall.
Thrice only since, with blended
might
The nations on that haughty height
Have met to scale the heaven :
Thrice only might a seraph's look
A moment's shade of sadness brook;
Such power to guilt was given.
Now the fierce Bear and Leopard
keen
Are perished as they ne'er had been,
Oblivion is their home:
Ambition's lioldest dream and last
Must melt before the clarion blast
That soimds the dirge of Home.
KEMBLE.
317
Heroes and kings, obey the charm,
Withdraw the proud high-reaching
arm ;
There is an oath on high,
That ne'er on brow of mortal birtli
Shall blend again the crowns ot
earth.
Nor in according cry
Her many voices mingling own
One tyrant lord, one idol throne:
But to His triumph soon
He shall descend who rules above,
And the pure language of his love
All tongues of men shall tune.
Nor let ambition heartless mourn;
When Babel's very ruins burn.
Her high desires may breathe ; —
O'ercome thyself, and thou may st
share
With Christ his Father's throne, and
wear
The world's imperial wreath.
Frances Anne Kemble.
ABSENCE.
What shall I do with all the days
and hours
That nuist be counted ere I see thy
face '? , 1 ^
How shall I charm the interval that
lowers
Between this time and that sweet
time of grace '?
Shall I in slumber steep each weary
SGllSC —
Weary with longing ? Shall I flee
away
Into past days, and with some fond
pretence
Cheat mvself to forget the present
day ?
Shall love for thee lay on my soul the
sin
Of casting from me God's great gift
of time •? [within
Shall I, these mists of memory locked
Leave and forget life's purposes
sublime ?
Oh, how. or by what means, may I
contrive
To bring the hour that brings thee
back more near '?
How may I teach my drooping hopes
to live , ^,
Until that blessed time, and thou
art here ?
I'll tell tliee; for thy sake I will lay
hold ^ ^
Of all good aims, and consecrate to
thee.
In worthy deeds, each moment that
is told
While thou, beloved one! art tar
from me.
For thee I will arouse my thoughts
to try . , ,
All heavenward flights, all high and
holy strains;
For thy dear sake I will walk pa-
tiently
Through these long hours, nor call
their minutes pains.
I will this dreary blank of absence
make
A noble task-time; and will therein
strive
To follow excellence, and to o ertake
More good than I have won since
yet I hve.
So may this doomed time build up in
me ,
A thousand graces, which shall
thus be thine;
So may my love and longing hallowed
And thy dear thought an influence
divine.
318
KEY.
FAITH.
Better trust all and be deceived,
And weep that trust and that deceiv-
ing,
Than doubt one heart, that if believed
Had blessed one's life with true be-
lievins;.
Oh, in this mocking world too fast
The doubting fiend o'ertakes our
youth :
Better be cheated to the last
Than lose the blessed hope of
truth.
Francis Scott Key.
THE STAR-SPANGLED BANNER.
Oh! say, can you see by the dawn's
early liglit
What so proudly we hailed at the
twilight's last gleaming, —
Whose broad stripes and bright stars
through the perilous fight,
O'er the ramparts we watched, were
so gallantly streaming!
And the rocket's red glare, the bombs
biu'sting in air
Gave proof through the night that
our flag was still there ;
Oh ! say, does that star-spangled ban-
ner yet wave
O'er the land of the free, and the
home of the brave ?
On that shore, dimly seen through
the mists of the deep,
Where the foe's haughty host in
dread silence reposes,
What is that which the breeze, o'er
the towering steep.
As it fitfully blows, now conceals,
now discloses ?
Now it catches the gleam of the
morning's first beam.
In full glory reflected, now shines on
the stream;
'Tis the star-spnngled banner; oh,
long may it wave
O'er the land of the free, and the
home of the brave !
And where is that band who so
vaimtingly swore
That the havoc of war and the bat-
tle's confusion
A home and a country should leave
us no more "?
Their blood has washed out their
foul footsteps' pollution.
No refuge could save the hireling and
slave
From the terror of flight, or the
gloom of the grave ;
And the star-spangled banner in tri-
mnph doth wave
O'er the land of the free, and the
home of the brave.
Oh! thus be it ever, when freemen
shall stand
Between their loved homes and the
war's desolation!
Blest with victory and peace, may the
heaven-rescued land
Praise the power that hath made and
preserved us a nation.
Then conquer we must, for our cause
it is just ;
And this be om- motto, — " In God is
our trust," —
And the star-spangled banner in tri-
umph shall wave
O'er the land of the free, and the
home of the brave.
KIMBALL.
319
Harriet McEwen Kimball.
GOOD NEWS.
A BEE flew in at my window,
And circled around my head ;
He came like a herald of summer-
time. .
And what do you think he saul .''
"As sure as the roses shall blos-
som " —
These are the words he said, —
" As sure as the gardens shall laugh
in pride,
And the meadows blush clover-red ;
"As sure as the golden robin
Shall build her a swinging nest.
And the capture(t sunbeam lie last-
locked
In the marigold's burning breast;
" As sure as the water-lilies
Shall float like a fairy fleet;
As sure as the torrent shall leap the
rocks
With foamy, fantastic feet;
" As sure as the bobolink's carol
And the plaint of the whippoorwill
Shall gladden the morning, and sad-
den the night.
And the crickets pipe loud antl
shrill ;
"So sure to the heart of the maiden
Who hath loved and sorrowed long,
Glad tidings shall bring the summer
of joy
AYith bursting of blossom and
song!"
A seer as well as a herald !
For while I sat weeping to-day,
The tenderest, cheeriest letter came
From Lionel far away.
Good news! O little bee-prophet.
Your words I will never forget!
It may be foolish,— that dear, old
sign,—
But Lionel's true to me yet!
TROUBLE TO LEND.
To-MORiiow has trouble to lend
To all who lack to-day;
Go, borrow it, — borrow, griefless
heart,
And thou with thy peace wilt pay!
To-morrow has trouble to lend,—
An endless, endless store ;
But I have as much as heart can
hold,—
Why should I borrow more !
HELIOTROPE.
Sweetest, sweetest. Heliotrope!
In the sunset's dying splendor.
In the trance of twilight tender,
Vll my senses I surrender.
To the subtle spells that bind me:
The dim air sA\imineth in my sight
With visions vague of soft delight;
Shadowy hands with endless chain
Of purple-clustered bloom enwmd
me ; —
Garlands drenched in dreamy rain
Of perfume passionate as sorrow
And sad as Love's to-morrow!
Bewildering music fills mine ears.—
Faint laughter and commingling
tears. —
Flowing like delicious pain
Through my drowsy brain.
Bosomed in the blissful gloom.—
Meseems I sink on slumberous
slope
Buried deep in puii^le bloom,
f^^veetest. sweetest Heliotrope!
Undulates the earth beneath me;
Still the shadow-hands enwreatU
me.
And clouds of faces half detined.
Lovely and fantastical,
jSweet, — O sweet! — and strange
withal.
Sweeping like a desert wind
Across my vision leave me blind!
Subtler grows the spell and stronger;
What enchantments weird possess
me, —
Now uplift me, now oppress me ?
Do I feast, or do I hunger ?
Is it bliss, or is it anguish ?
Is it Auster's treaclierous breatli
Kissing me witli honeyed deatli,
Wliile I sicken, droop, and languisli ?
Still I feel my blood's dull beat
In my head and liands and feet;
Struggling faintly with thy sweet-
ness.
Heliotrope! Heliotrope!
Give nie back my strength's com-
pleteness.
Must I pine and languisli ever !
Wilt tliou loose my senses never!
Wilt thou bloom and bloom for ever,
Oil, Lethean Heliotrope '?
Ah, the night-wind, freshly blowing,
Sets the languid blood a-flowing !
I revive! —
I escape thy spells alive !
Flower ! I love and do not love thee !
Hold my breath, but bend above tliee;
Crusli thy buds, yet bid them ope ;
Sweetest, sweetest Heliotrope!
DA Y-DREAMING.
How better am I
Than a butterfly ?
Here, as tlie noiseless hours go by,
Hour by hour,
I cling to my fancy's lialf-blown
flower :
Over its sweetness I brood and brood,
And scarcely stir, tliougli sounds in-
trude
That would trouble and fret another
mood
Less divine
Than mine !
Who cares for the bees ?
I will take my ease,
IJream and dream as long as I
please ;
Hour by hour.
With love-wings fanning my sweet,
sweet flower!
(iatlier your honey, and hoard your
gold,
Through spring and summer, and
liive througli cold !
I will cling to my flower till it is
mould,
Breatlie one sigh
And die!
THE LAST APPEAL.
The room is sweiit and garnished for
thy sake;
The table spread witli Love's most
liberal cheer;
The fire is blazing brightly on the
liearth;
Faith lingers yet to give tliee wel-
come iiere.
When,^\ ilt thou come ?
Daily I weave tlie aiiy web of
hope;
Frail as the spider's, wiouglit witli
beads of dew, —
That, lilve Penelope's, each night un-
done,
Eacli morn in patience I begin
anew.
When wilt tliou come ?
Not yet! To-morrow Faith Mill take
her flight.
The fire die out, the banquet dis-
appear ;
Forever will these fingers drop the
web.
And only desolation "wait thee here.
Oh, come to-day!
KINQSLEY
321
Charles Kingsley.
A FAREWELL.
My fairest child, I have no song to
give you,
No lark could pipe to skies so dull
and gray ;
Yet, ere we part, one lesson I can
leave you
For every day : —
Be good, my dear, and let who will,
be clever;
Uo noble things, not dream them,
all day long;
And so make life, death, and the vast
forever
One grand, sweet song.
2'HE THREE FISHERS.
TiiKEE fishers went sailing away to
the "West —
Away to the West as the sun went
down ;
Each thought on the woman who
loved hini the best.
And the children stood watching
them out of the town ;
For men must work, and women must
weep ;
And there's little to earn and many
to keep.
Though the harbor-bar be moan-
ing.
Three wives sat up in the lighthouse
tower
And trimmed the lamps as the sun
went down ;
They looked at the squall, and they
looked at the shower.
And the night-rack came rolling
up, ragged and brown.
But men must work and women must
weep.
Though storms be sudden and waters
deep.
And the harbor-bar be moan-
Three corpses lay out on the shining
sands
In the morning gleam as the tide
went down.
And the women are weeping and
wringing their hands.
For those who will never come back
to the town ;
For men must work, and women must
weep —
And the sooner it's over, the sooner
to sleep —
And good-bye to the bar and its
moaning.
DOLCINO TO MARGARET.
The world goes up and the world
goes down.
And the sunshine follows the
rain ;
And yesterday's sneer and yesterday's
frown
Can never come over again.
Sweet wife;
No, never come over again.
For Avoman is warm, though man be
cold.
And the night will hallow the
day;
Till the heart which at eve was weary
and old
Can rise in the morning gay,
Sweet wife ;
To its work in the morning gay.
SANDS OF DEE.
" O Makv, go and call the cattle
home,
And call the cattle home
And call the cattle home.
Across the sands of Dee! "
The western wind was wild and dank
Avith foam
And all alone went she.
322
KNOX.
The western tide crept up along the
Above the nets at sea ?
sand,
Was never salmon yet that shone so
And o'er and o'er the sand,
fair.
And round and round the sand,
Among the stakes on Dee."
As far as eye could see.
The rolling mist came down and hid
They rowed her in across the rolling
the land
foam —
And never home came she.
The cruel, crawling foam.
The cruel, hungry foam —
" Oh is it weed, or fish, or floating
To her grave beside the sea ;
hair —
But still the boatmen hear her call
A tress of golden hair,
the cattle home
A drowned maiden's hair —
Across the sands of Dee.
William Knox.
OH! WHY SHOULD THE SPIRIT OF MORTAL BE PROUD-:
Oh ! why should the spirit of mortal
be proud ?
Like a swift-fleeting meteor, a fast-
flying cloud,
A flash of the lightning, a break of
the wave.
He passeth from life to his rest in the
grave.
The leaves of the oak and the willow
shall fade,
Be scattered around, and together be
laid ;
As the young and the old, the low
and the high.
Shall crumble to dust and together
shall lie.
The infant, a mother attended and
loved,
The mother, that infant's affection
who proved,
The father, that mother and infant
who blest.
Each, all, are away to that dwelling
of rest.
The maid, on whose brow, on whose
cheek, in whose eye.
Shone beauty and pleasure, — her tri-
umphs are by ;
And alike from the minds of the liv-
ing erased
Are the memories of mortals who
loved her and praised.
The head of the king, that the sceptre
hath borne;
The brow of the priest, that the mitre
hath worn;
The eye of the sage, and the heart of
the brave, —
Are hidden and lost in the depths of
the grave.
The peasant, whose lot was to sow
and to reap;
The herdsman, who climbed with his
goats up the steep ;
The beggar, who wandered in search
of his bread, —
Have faded away like the grass that
we tread.
So the multitude goes, like the flower
or weed.
That A^ithers away to let others suc-
ceed ;
So the multitude comes, even those
we behold,
To repeat e\'ery tale that has often
been told.
For we are the same that our fathers
have been ;
\Vc see the same sights that our
fathers have seen:
We drink tlie same stream, and we
feel the same sun.
And run the same course that our
fatliers have run.
The thoughts we are thinlcing our
fatliers did think;
From the death we are shrinking our
fathers did shrink;
To the life we are clinging our fa-
thers did cling,
But it speeds from us all like the bird
on the wing.
They loved, — but the story we can-
not unfold ;
They scorned, — but the heart of the
haughty is cold ;
They grieved, — but no wail from
their slumbers will come;
They joyed, — but the tongue of their
gladness is dumb.
They died, — ah! they died; — Ave,
things that are now,
That walk on the turf that lies over
their brow.
And make in their dwelling a tran-
sient abode.
Meet the things that they met on their
pilgrimage road.
Yea, hope and despondency, pleasure
and pain,
Are mingled together in sunshine and
rain :
And the smile and the tear, and the
song and the dirge,
Still follow each other like surge
upon surge.
'Tis the wink of an eye; 'tis the
draught of a breath
From the blossom of health to the
paleness of death.
From the gilded saloon to the bier
and the shroud;
Oh ! why should the spirit of mortal
be proud ?
Marie R. Lacoste.
SOMEBODY'S DARLING.
Into a ward of the whitewashed
walls,
AVhere the dead and dying lay,
Womided by bayonets, shells, and
balls,
Somebody's darling was borne one
day —
Somebody's darling, so young, and so
brave,
Wearing yet on his pale sweet face,
Soon to be hid by the dust of the
grave.
The lingering light of his boyhood's
grace.
Matted and damp are the cuils of
gold, [brow;
Kissing the snow of that fair young
Pale are the lips of delicate mould —
Somebody's darling is dying now.
Back from his beautiful, blue-veined
brow,
Brush all the wandering waves of
gold.
Cross his hands on his bosom now.
Somebody's darling is still and
cold.
Kiss him once for somebody's sake,
Murmur a prayer soft and low ;
One bright curl from its fair mates
take.
They were somebody's pride, you
know :
Somebody's liand has rested there. —
Was it a mother's soft and white ?
And have the lips of a sister fair
Been baptized in those waves of
light ?
324
LAIGHTON.
God knows best — he was somebody's
love;
ISomebody's heart enshrined him
til ere ;
Somebody wafted his name above
Night and morn on the wings of
prayer.
Somebody wept when he marched
away
Looking so handsome, brave, and
grand ;
Somebody's kiss on his forehead
lay,
Somebody chmg to his parting
hand.
Somebody's waiting and watching for
him —
Yearning to hold him again to the
heart ;
And there he lies with his bine eyes
dim.
And the smiling, childlike lips
apart.
Tenderly bury the fair young dead,
Pausing to drop on his grave a
tear ;
Carve on the wooden slab at his
head, —
"Somebody's darling slumbers
here."
Albert Laighton.
UNDER THE LEAVES.
Oft have I walked these woodland
paths.
Without the blest foreknowing
That underneath the withered leaves
The fairest buds were growing.
To-day the south-wind sweeps away
The types of autiunn's splendor.
And shows the sweet arbutus flowers.
Spring's children, pure and tender.
O prophet-flowers! — with lips of
bloom.
Outvying in your beauty
The pearly tints of ocean shells, —
Ye teach me faith and duty !
" Walk life's dark ways," ye seem to
say,
"With love's divine foreknowing,
'I'hat Avhere man sees but withered
leaves,
(Jod sees sweet flowers growing."
nr THE DEAD.
Savekt winter roses, stainless as the
snow.
As was thy life, O tender heart and
true !
A cross of lilies that our tears bedew,
A garland of the fairest flowers that
grow.
And filled with fragrance as the
thought of thee.
We lay, with loving hand, upon thy
breast.
Wrapt in the calm of Death's great
mystery ;
Ours still to feel the pairi, the unlan-
guaged woe.
The bitter sense of loss, the vague
unrest.
And wear unseen the cypress-leaf
and rue.
Thinking, the while, of lovelier flow-
ers that blow
In everlasting gardens of the blest.
That wither not like these, and never
shed
Their rare and heavenly odors for the
dead.
LAMB.
825
Charles Lamb.
OLD FAMILIAR FACES.
I HAVE had playmates, I have liad
companions,
In my days of childhood, in my joy-
ful school-days;
All, all are gone, the old familiar
faces.
1 have been laughing, I have been
carousing.
Drinking late, sitting late, with ray
bosom cronies;
All, all are gone, the old familiar
faces.
I loved a love once, fairest among
women ;
Closed are her doors on me, I must
not see her;
All, all are gone, the old familiar
faces.
1 have a friend, a kinder friend has
no man ;
Like an ingrate, I left my friend ab-
ruptly —
Left him to muse on the old familiar
faces.
Ghost-like I paced roimd the haunts
of my childhood.
Earth seemed a desert I was bound
to traverse.
Seeking to find the old familiar
faces.
Friend of my bosom, thou more than
a brother.
Why wert not thou born in my fa-
ther's dwelling?
So might we talk of the old familiar
faces —
How some they have died, and some
they have left me.
And some are taken from me; all are
departed.
All, all are gone, the old familiar
faces !
HESTER.
When maidens such as Hester die.
Their place ye may not well supply,
Though ye among a thousand try,
AVitli vain endeavor.
A month or more has she been dead,
Yet cannot I by force be led
To tliink upon the wormy bed
And her together.
A springy motion in her gait,
A rising step, did indicate
Of pride and joy no common rate,
That flushed her spirit:
I know not by what name beside
I shall it call ; — if 't was not pride.
It was a joy to that allied.
She did inherit.
Her parents held the Quaker rule.
Which doth the liuman feelings cool ;
But slie was trained in nature's
school,
Nature had blessed her.
A waking eye, a prying mind,
A heart that stirs, is hard to bind;
A hawk's keen sight ye cannot
blind, —
Ye could not Hester.
My sprightly neighbor, gone before
To that unknown and silent shore !
Shall we not meet as heretofore
Some summer morning;
When from thy cheerful eyes a ray
Hath struck a I)liss upon the day, —
A bliss that would not go away, —
A sweet forewarning ?
THE HOUSEKEEPER.
The frugal snail, with forecast of re-
pose,
Carries his house with him where'er
he goes ;
326
LANDON.
Peeps out, — and if there comes a
shower of rain,
Retreats to his small domicile
again.
Touch but a tip of liim, a horn, — 'tis
well, —
He curls uji in his sanctuary shell.
He's his own landlord, his own ten-
ant; stay
Long as he will, he dreads no quar-
ter-day.
Himself he boards and lodges; both
invites
And feasts himself ; sleeps with him-
self o' nights.
He spares the upholsterer trouble to
jjrocure [ture,
Chattels; himself is his own furni-
And his sole riches. Wheresoe'er he
roam, —
Knock when you will, — he's sure to
be at home.
L^TiTiA Elizabeth Landon.
SUCCESS ALONE SEEX.
Few know of life's beginnings —
men behold
The goal achieved ; — the warrior,
when his sword
Flashes red triumph in the noonday
sun ;
The poet, when his lyre hangs on the
palm ;
The statesman, when the crowd pro-
claim his voice.
And mould opinion on his gifted
tongue :
They count not life's first steps, and
never think
Upon the many miserable hours
When hope deferred was sickness to
the heart.
They reckon not the battle and the
march.
The long privations of a wasted
youth ;
They never see the banner till un-
furled.
What are to them the solitary nights
Passed pale and anxiously by the
sickly lamp,
Till the young poet wins the world at
last
To listen to the music long his own ?
The crowd attend the statesman's
fiei'y mind
That makes their destiny ; but they
do not trace
Its struggle, or its long expectancy.
Hard are life's early steps; and, but
that youth
Is buoyant, confident, and strong in
hope.
Men would behold its threshold, and
despair.
THE LITTLE SHROUD.
She had lost many children — now
The last of them was gone :
And day and night she sat and wept
Beside the funeral stone.
One midnight, while her constant
tears
Were falling with the dew.
She heard a v-oice, and lo ! her child
Stood by her, weeping too !
His shroud was damp, his face was
white;
He said — "I cannot sleep.
Your tears have made my shroud so
wet ;
O mother, do not weep! "'
Oh, love is strong! — the mother's
heart
Was filled wilh tender fears;
Oh, love is strong! — and for her
child
Her grief restrained its tears.
LANDOR.
3-27
One eve a light shone round her bed,
And there she saw hhn stand —
Her infant in liis little shroud,
A taper in his hand.
•• Lol mother, see my shroud is dry.
And I can sleep once more!''
And beautiful the parting smile
The little infant wore.
The mother went her household
ways —
Again she knelt in prayer,
And" only asked of heaven its aid
Her heavy lot to bear.
THE POET.
Ah, deeply the minstrel has felt all
he sings.
Every passion he paints his own
bosom has known ;
No note of wild music is swept from
the strings.
But first his own feelings have
echoed the tone.
Then say not his love is a fugitive
fire.
That the heart can be ice Avhile the
lip is of flame :
Oh, say not that truth does not dwell
with the lyre :
For the pulse of the heart and the
harp are the same.
SIR WALTER SCOTT AT POMPEII.
I SEE the ancient master pale and
worn,
Though on him shines the lovely
southern heaven,
And Naples greets him with festivity.
The dying by the dead : for his great
sake
They have laid bare the city of the
lost:
His own creations fill the silent
streets ;
The Roman pavement rings with
golden spurs.
The Highland plaid shades dark Ital-
ian eyes,
x\nd the young king himself is
Ivanhoe.
But there the old man sits, — majes-
tic, wan.
Himself a mighty vision of the past;
The glorious mind has bowed beneath
its toil;
He does not hear his name on foreign
lips
That thank him for a thousand happy
hours :
He does not see the glittering groups
that press
In wonder and in homage to his side ;
Death is beside his triumph.
Walter Savage Landor.
RUBIES.
Often I have heard it said
That her lips are ruby red.
Little heed I what they say,
I have seen as red as they.
Ere she smiled on other men,
Real rubies were they then.
Wlien she kissed me once in play.
Rubies were less bright than they,
And less bright were those which
shone
In the palace of the sun.
Will they be as bright again?
Not if kissed by other men.
IN XO HASTE.
Nay, thank me not again for those
Camellias, that untimely rose;
But if, whence you might please the
more,
828
LANIER.
And win the few unwon before,
I sought the flowers you love to wear,
O'er joyed to see them in your liair,
Upon my grave. I pray you set
One primrose or one violet.
. . . Stay ... 1 can wait a little yet.
ROSE AYLMER.
Air, what avails the sceptred race ?
Ah, what the form divine ?
What every virtue, every grace ?
Hose Ayluier, all were thine.
Rose Aylmer, whom these wakeful
eyes
May weep but never see,
A night of memories and of sighs
I consecrate to thee.
DEATH OF THE DAY.
My pictures blacken in their frames
As night comes on,
And youthful maids and wrinkled
dames
Are now all one.
Death of the Day ! a sterner Death
Did worse before ;
The fairest form, the sweetest breath,
Away he bore.
/ WILL NOT LOVE.
I WILL not love ! These sounds
have often
Burst from a troubled breast ;
Rarely from one no sighs could soften,
Rarely from one at rest.
A REQUEST.
The place where soon I think to lie,
In its old creviced nook hard by,
Rears many a weed :
If parties bring you there, will you
Drop slyly in a grain or two
Of wallflower seed ?
I shall not see it, and (too sure!)
I shall not ever hear that your
Light step was there ;
But the rich odor some fine day
Will, what I cannot do, repay
That little care.
Sidney Lanier.
EVENING SONG.
Look off, dear Love, across the sal-
low sands.
And mark yon meeting of the sun
and sea ;
How long they kiss in sight of all the
lands !
Ah, longer, longer we.
Now in the sea's red vintage melts
the sun,
As Egypt's pearl dissolved in rosy
wine.
And Cleopatra Night drinks all. 'Tis
done !
Love, lay thy hand in mine.
Come forth, sweet stars, and comfort
heaven's heart;
fHimmer, ye waves, round else un-
lighted sands;
O Night, divorce our sun and moon
apart, —
Never our lips, our hands.
FROM THE FLATS.
What heartache, — ne'er a hill!
Inexorable, vapid, vague and chill.
The drear sand-levels drain my spirit
low,
With one i^oor word they tell me all
they know;
S^
LARCOM.
329
Whereat their stupid tongues, to
tease my pain,
Do draw it o'er again and o'er again.
They liurt my heart with griefs I
cannot name:
Always the same, the same.
Nature hath no surprise.
No ambuscade of beauty, 'gainst
mine eyes
From brake, or lurking dell, or deep
defile ;
No humors, frolic forms, — this mile,
that mile ;
No rich reserves or happy-valley
hopes
Beyond the bends of roads, the dis-
tant slopes.
Her fancy fails, her wild is all run
tame:
Ever the same, the same.
Oh ! might I through these tears
But glimpse some hill my Georgia
high uprears,
Where white the quartz, and pink
the pebbles shine,
The hickory heavenward strives, the
muscadine
Swings o'er the sloi^e; the oak's far-
falling shade
Darkens the dog- wood in the bottom
glade,
And down the hollow from a ferny
nook
Bright leaps a living brook!
BETRAYAL.
The sun has kissed the violet sea.
And turned the violet to a rose.
O Sea ! wouldst thou not better be
Mere violet still ? Who knows ?
who knows ?
Well hides the violet in the wood:
The dead leaf wrinkles her a hood.
And winter's ill is violet's good;
But the bold glory of the rose.
It quickly conies and quickly goes;
Red petals whirling in white snows,
Ah me !
The sun has burnt the rose-red sea :
The rose is turned to ashes gray.
O Sea ! O Sea ! mightst thou but be
The violet thou hast been to-day I
The sun is brave, the sun is briglit.
The sun is lord of love and light;
But after him it cometh night.
O anguish of the lonesome dark !
Once a girl's body, stiff and stark.
Was laid in a tomb without a marl^.
Ah me !
Lucy Largom.
HANNAH BINDING SHOES.
Poor lone Hannah,
Sitting at the window, binding shoes,
Faded, wrinkled.
Sitting, stitching, in a nioiu'nful
muse.
Bright-eyed beauty once was she.
When the bloom was on the tree :
Spring and winter,
Hannah's at the window, binding
shoes.
Not a neighbor.
Passing nod or answer will refuse.
To her whisper,
" Is there from the fishers any
news ?"
Oh, her heart's adrift, with one
(Jn an endless voyage gone !
Night and morning.
Hannah's at the window, binding
shoes.
Fair young Hannah,
Ben, the sunburnt fisher, gayly woos:
Hale and clever.
For a willing heart and hand he sues.
May-day skies are all aglow.
And the waves are laughing so!
330
LARCOM.
For her wedding
Hannah leaves her window and her
shoes.
May is passing:
Mid tlie apple-boughs a pigeon coos,
Hannah shudders,
For the mild southwester miscliief
brews.
Round the rocks of Marblehead,
Outward bound, a schooner sped:
Silent, lonesome,
Hannah's at the window, binding
shoes.
'Tis Xovember,
Now no tear her wasted cheek be-
dews.
From Newfoundland
Not a sail returning will she lose.
Whispering hoarsely, " Fishermen,
Have you, have you heard of
Ben?"
Old with watching,
Hannah's at the windoAV, binding
shoes.
Twenty winters
Bleach and tear the ragged shore she
views
Twenty seasons, —
Never one has brought her any news.
Still her dim eyes silently
Chase the white sails o'er the sea:
Hopeless, faithful,
Hannah's at the window, binding
shoes.
[From Hints.]
THE CURTAIN OF THE DARK.
The cmtain of the dark
Is piei'ced by many a rent :
Out of the star-wells, spark on spark
Trickles through night's torn tent.
Grief is a tattered tent
Wherethrough God's light doth
shine.
Who glances up, at every rent
Shall catch a ray divine.
UNWEDDED.
Behold her there in the evening
sun.
That kindles the Indian summer
trees
To a separate burning bush, one by
one.
Wherein the Glory Divine she sees !
Mate and nestlings she never had:
Kith and kindred have passed
away ;
Yet the sunset is ]iot more gently
glad,
That follows her shadow, and fain
would stay.
For out of her life goes a breath of
bliss.
And a sunlike charm from her
cheerful eye.
That the cloud and tlie loitering
l)reeze would miss;
A balm that refreshes the passer-
by.
"Did she choose it, tills single life?"
Gossip, she salth not, and who can
tell ?
But many a mother, and many a
wife,
Draws a lot more lonely, we all
know well.
Doubtless she had her romantic
dream.
Like other maidens, in May-time
sweet.
That flushes the air with a lingering
gleam.
And goldens the grass beneath her
feet: —
A dream unmoulded to visible form,
That keeps the world I'osy with
mists of youth.
And holds her in loyalty close and
warm.
To her fine ideal of manly truth.
" But is she happy, a woman alone ? "
Gossip, alone in this crowded
earth.
LARCOM.
331
With a voice to quiet its hourly
moan,
And a smile to heighten its rarer
mirth I
There are ends more worthy than
happiness :
Who seeks it, is digging joy's
grave, we know.
The blessed are they who but live to
bless;
She found out that mystery, long
ago.
To her motherly, sheltering atmos-
l^here,
The children hasten from icy
homes :
The outcast is welcome to share her
cheer;
And the saint with a fervent beni-
son comes.
For the heart of woman is large as
man's;
God gave her his orphaned world
to hold,
And whispered through her His
deeper plans
To save it alive from the outer
cold.
And here is a woman who under-
stood
Herself, her work, and God's will
with her.
To gather and scatter His sheaves of
good.
And was meekly thankful, though
men demur.
Would she have walked more nobly,
think.
With a man beside her, to point
the way,
Hand joining liand in the marriage-
link ?
Possibly, Yes; it is likelier, Nay.
For all men have not wisdom and
might:
Love's eyes are tender, and blur
the map;
And a wife will follow by faith, not
sight,
In the chosen footprint, at any
hap.
In the comfort of home who is glad-
der than she ?
Yet, stirred by no murnuu- of
" might have been,"
Her heart as a carolling bird soars
free,
With tlie song of each nest she has
glanced within.
Having the whole, she covets no
part :
Hers is the bliss of all blessed
things.
The tears that unto her eyelids
start,
Are those which a generous pity
brings ;
Or the sympathy of heroic faith
AVith a holy purpose, achieved or
lost.
To stifle the truth is to stop her
breath.
For she rates a lie at its deadly
cost.
Her friends are good women and
faithful men,
AVho seek for the true, and uphold
the right ;
And who shall proclaim her the
weaker, when
Her very presence puts sin to flight?
"And dreads she never the coming
years '? "
Gossip, what are the yeai's to
her ?
All winds are fair, and the harbor
nears.
And every breeze a delight will
stir.
Transfigured under the sunset trees.
That wreathe her Avith shadowy
gold anil red.
She looks away to the purple seas.
Whereon her shallop will soon be
sped.
332
LARCOM:
She reads the hereafter by the here:
A beautiful Now, and a better To
Be:
In Hfe is all sweetness, in death no
fear, —
You waste your pity on such as
she.
HAND IX HAND WITH ANGELS.
Hand in hand with angels,
Through the world we go ;
Brighter eyes are on us
Than we blind ones know ;
Tenderer voices cheer us
Than we deaf will own ;
Never, walking heavenward.
Can we walk alone.
Hand in hand with angels,
In the busy street,
By the winter hearth-fires, —
Everywhere, — we meet.
Though unfledged and songless.
Birds of Paradise;
Heaven looks at us daily
Out of human eyes.
Hand in hand with angels ;
Oft in menial guise;
By the same strait pathway
Prince and beggar rise.
If we drop the fingers,
Toil-imbrowned and worn.
Then one link with heaven
From our life is torn.
Hand in hand with angels:
Some are fallen, — alas!
Soiled wings trail pollution
Over all "they pass.
Lift them into sunshine!
Bid them seek the sky !
Weaker is your soaring.
When they cease to fly.
Hand in hand with angels;
Some are out of sight,
Leading us, imknowing.
Into paths of light.
Some dear hands are loosened
From our earthly clasp,
Soul in soul to hold us
With a firmer grasp.
Hand in hand with angels, —
'Tis a twisted chain.
Winding heavenward, earthward,
Linking joy and pain.
There's a mournful jarring,
'J'here's a clank of doubt,
If a heart grows heavy.
Or a hand's left out.
Hand in hand with angels
AValking every day ; —
How the chain may lengthen.
None of us can say.
But we know it reaches
From earth's lowliest one,
To the shining seraph.
Throned beyond the sun.
Hand in hand with angels!
Blessed so to be!
Helped are all the helpers;
Giving light, they see.
He who aids another
Strengthens more than one ;
Sinking earth he grapples
To tiie Great White Throne.
A SrniP OF BLUE.
I DO not own an inch of land.
But all 1 see is mine. —
The orchard and the mowing-fields,
The lawns and gardens fine.
The winds my tax-collectors are.
They bring me tithes divine, —
Wild scents and subtle essences,
A tribute rare and free:
And more magnificent than all,
My window keeps for me
A glimpse of blue inunensity, —
A little strip of sea.
Richer am I than he who owns
Great fleets and argosies ;
I have a share in every ship
Won by the inland breeze
To loiter on yon airy road
Above the apple-trees.
I freight them with my untold
dreams.
!»:
LARCOM.
333
Each bears my own picked crew ;
And nobler cargoes wait for thon
Tliau ever India knew, —
My ships lliat sail into the East
Across that outlet blue.
Sometimes they seem like living
shapes, —
The people of the sky, —
Guests in white raiment coming
down
From heaven, which is close by:
I call them by familiar names,
As one by one draws nigh,
So white, so light, so spirit-like,
From violet mists they bloom !
The aching wastes of the unknown
Are half reclaimed from gloom.
Since on life's hospitable sea
All souls find sailing-room.
The ocean grows a weariness
With nothing else in sight ;
Its east and west, its north and
south.
Spread out from morn to night:
We miss the warm, caressing shore,
Its brooding shade and light.
A part is greater than the whole ;
By hints are mysteries told ;
The fringes of eternity. —
God's sweeping garment-fold.
In that bright shred of glimmering
sea,
I reach out for, and hold.
The sails, like flakes of roseate pearl,
Float in upon the mist;
The waves are broken precious
stones, —
Sapphire and amethyst.
Washed from celestial basement walls
By suns unsetting kissed.
Out through the utmost gates of
space.
Past where the gay stars drift.
To the widening Infinite, my soul
Glides on, a vessel swift;
Yet loses not her anchorage
In yonder azure rift.
Here sit I, as a little child:
The threshold of God's door
Is that clear band of chrysoprase ;
Now the vast temple floor,
The blinding glory of the dome
I bow myliead before.
The universe, O God, is home.
In height or depth, to me;
Yet here upon thy footstool green
Content am I to be ;
Glad, when is opened to my need
Some sea-like glimpse of thee.
[From Hintg.']
HEAVES \EAJ! THE VinTUOCS.
They whose hearts are whole and
strong.
Loving holiness,
Living clean from soil of wrong.
Wearing truth's white dress, —
They unto no far-off height
Wearily need climb;
Heaven to them is close in sight
From these shores of time.
Only the anointed eye
Sees in common things, —
Gleams dropped daily from the sky;
Heavenly blossomings.
To the hearts where light has birth
Nothing can be drear;
Budding through the bloom of earth,
Heaven is always near.
384
LATH It OP.
George Parsons Lathrop.
TO MV SOX.
Do you remember, my sweet, absent
son,
How in the soft June days forever
done
You loved the heavens so warm and
clear and high ;
And when I lifted you, soft came
your cry —
"Put me 'way up — 'way up in the
blue sky '? ' '
I laughed and said I could not ; set
you down,
Your gray eyes Avonder-filled beneath
that crown
Of bright hair gladdening me as you
raced by.
Another P'ather now, more strong
than I,
Uas borne you voiceless to your dear
blue sky.
NEW WORLDS.
With my beloved I lingered late one
night.
At last the hour when I nuist leave
her came :
But, as I turned, a fear I could not
name
Possessed me that the long sweet
evening might
Prelude some sudden storm, whereby
delight
8hould perisli. Wliat if Death, ere
dawn, should claim
One of us ? What, though living,
not the same
Each sliould appear to each in morn-
ing light ?
Changed did I find her, truly, the
next day:
Ne'er could I see her as of old
again.
That strange mood seemed to draw a
cloud away.
And let her Ijeauty pour through
every vein
Sunlight and life, part of me. Thus
the lover
With each new morn a new world
may discover.
THE LILY-POND.
Some fairy spirit with his wand,
I think, has hovered o'er the dell,
And spread this film upon the pond.
And touclied it with tliis drowsy
spell,
For here the musing soul is merged
In moods no other scene can bring,
And sweeter seems the air when
scourged
With wandering wild-bees' mur-
muring.
One ripple streaks the little lake.
Sharp purple-blue; the birches,
thin
And silvery, crowd the edge, yet
break
To let a straying sunbeam in.
How came we through the yielding
wood.
That day, to this sweet-rustling
shore ?
Oh, there together while we stood,
A butterfly was wafted o'er.
In sleepy light; and even now
His glimmering beauty doth return
Upon me when the soft winds blow.
And lilies toward the sunlight
yearn.
The yielding wood ? And yet 'twas
loth
To yield unto our happy march;
Doubtful it seemed, at times, if both
Could pass its green, elastic arch.
LATHROP.
585
Yet there, at last, upon the marge
We found ourselves, and there, be-
hold,
In hosts the lilies, white and large,
Lay close with hearts of downy
gold !
Deep in the weedy waters spread
The rootlets of the placid bloom :
So sprung my love's flower, that was
bred
In deep still waters of heart's-
gloom.
So sprung; and so that morn was
nursed
To live in light, and on the pool
Wherein its roots were deep immersed
Burst into beauty broad and cool.
Few words were said; a moment
passed ;
I know not how it came — that awe
And ardor of a glance that cast
Our love in universal law.
But all at once a bird sang loud.
From dead twigs of the gleamy
beech ;
His notes dropped dewy, as from a
cloud,
A blessing on our married speech.
Ah, Love ! how fresh and rare, even
now.
That moment and that mood re-
ttn-n
Upon me, when the soft winds l)low.
And lilies toward the sunlight
yearn !
SAILOR'S SONG.
The
sea goes up, the sky comes
down.
Oh, can you spy the ancient town, —
The granite hills so hard and gray.
That rib the land behind the bay ?
O ye ho, boys! Spread her wings!
Fair winds, boys: send her home!
O ye ho!
Three years ? Is it so long that we
Have lived upon the lonely sea ?
Oh, often 1 thought we'd see the
town.
When the sea went up, and the sky
came down.
O ye ho, boys ! Spread her wings !
Fair winds, boys ; send her home !
O ye ho !
Even the winter winds would rouse
A memory of my father's house;
For round his windows and his door
They made the same deep, mouthless
roar.
O ye ho, boys! Spread her wings!
Fair winds, boys : send her home !
O ye ho !
And when the summer's breezes
beat,
Methought I saw the sunny street
Where stood my Kate. Beneath her
hand
She gazed far out, far out from land.
O ye ho, boys ! Spread her wings !
Fair winds, boys : send her home !
O ye lio !
Fartliest away, I oftenest dreamed
That I was with her. Then, it
seemed
A single stride the ocean wide
Had bridged and brought me to her
side.
O ye ho, boys ! Spread lier wings !
Fair winds, boys: s(-nd her home!
Oyeho!
But though so near we're drawing,
now,
'T is farther off — I know not how.
We sail and sail : we see no home.
Would we into the port were come I
O ye ho, boys! Spread her wings!
Fair winds, boys : send her home I
Oyeho!
At night, the same stars o'er the
mast :
The mast sways round — however fast
38<;
LAZARUS.
We fly — still sways and swings
around
One scanty circle's starry bound.
O ye ho, boys! .Spread her wings I
Fair winds, boys: send her home!
O ye ho !
Ah. many a month those stars have
shone.
And many a golden morn has flown,
Since that so'solenui happy morn,
When, I away, my babe was born.
O ye ho, boys ! Spread her wings !
Fair winds, boys: send her home!
O ye ho!
And, though so near we're drawing
now,
'T is farther otf — I know not how —
I would not aught amiss had come
To babe or mother there, at home !
O ye ho, boys ! Spread her wings !
Fair winds, boys: send her home!
O ye ho!
■Tis but a seeming; swiftly rush
The seas, beneath. 1 hear the crush
Of foamy ridges 'gainst the prow.
Longing outspeeds the breeze, I know.
O ye ho, boys! Spread her wings!
Fair winds, boys: send her home!
O ye ho !
Patience, my mates! Though not
this eve,
We cast our anchor, yet believe,
If but the wind holds, short the run :
We'll sail in with to-morrow's sun.
O ye ho, boys ! Spread her wings !
Fair winds, boys : send her home !
i) ye ho !
A FACE IN THE STREET.
PooK, withered face, that yet was
once so fair.
Grown ashen-old in the wild fires
of lust —
Thy star-like beauty, dimmed with
earthly dust,
Yet breathing of a pm-er native air;
They who, whilom, cursed vultures,
sought a share
Of thy dead womanhood, their
greed unjust
Have satisfied, have stripped and
left thee bare.
Still, like a leaf warped by the au-
tumn gust.
And driving to the end, thou wrapp'st
in flame
And perfume all thy hollow-eyed
decay.
Feigning on those gray cheeks the
blush that Shame
Took with her when she fled long
since away.
Ah God! rain fire iipon this foul-
souled eity
That gives such death, and spares its
men, — for pity!
Emma Lazarus.
[From Scenes in the Wood. Siujyested by
Jiobert Schumann.']
PLEASANT PROSPECT.
Hail, free, clear heavens! above our
heads again,
With white-winged clouds that melt
before the sun :
Hail, good green earth! with blos-
soms, grass and grain :
O'er the soft rye what silvery rip-
ples run !
What tawny shado^\■s ! Slowly we
have won
This high hill's top: on the wood's
edge we stand.
While like a sea below us rolls the
land.
The meadows blush with clover, and
the air
Is honeyed with its keen but spicy
smell ;
In silence graze the kine, but every-
where
LAZABUS.
887
I'ipe the glad birds that in the for-
est dwell ;
Where hearths are set curled
wreaths of vapor tell;
Life's grace and promise win the soul
again ;
Hope floods the heart like sunshine
after rain.
The wood is past, and tranquil mead-
ows wide,
Bathed in bright vapor, stretch on
every side.
[From Scenes in t/te Wood. Suggested by
Robert Schumann.]
NIGHT.
White stars begin to prick the wan
blue sky.
The trees arise, thick, black and
tall: between
Their slim, dark boles, gray, film-
winged gnats that fly
Against the failing western red are
seen.
The footpaths dimib with moss
have lost their green.
Mysterious shadows settle every-
where,
A passionate murmur trembles in the
air.
Sweet scents wax richer, freshened
with cool dews,
The whole vast forest seems to
breathe, to sigh
With rustle, hmn and whisper that
confuse
The listening ear, blent with the
fitful cry
Of some belated bird. In the far
sky.
Throbbing with stars, there stirs a
weird unrest.
Strange joy, akin to pain, fulfils the
breast —
A longing born of fears and promises,
A Willi desire, a hope that heeds no
bound.
A ray of ]noonlightstruggling through
the trees
Startles us like a i)hantoni; on the
ground
Fall curious shades; white glory
spreads ai-oimd;
A MARCH VIOLET.
Black boughs against a pale clear
sky.
Slight mists of cloud-wreaths floating
by:
Soft sinilight, gray-blue smoky air,
Wet thawing snows on hillsides bare;
Loud streams, moist sodden earth;
below
Quick seedlings stir, rich juices flow
Through frozen veins of rigid wood,
And the whole forest bestirs in bud.
Xo longer stark the branches spread
An iron network overhead.
Albeit naked still of green;
Through this soft, lustrous vapor
seen
On budding boughs a warm flush
glows.
With tints of purple and pale rose.
Bi-eathing of spring, the delicate air
Lifts playfully the loosend hair
To kiss the cool brow. Let us rest
In this bright, sheltered nook, now
blest
AVith broad noon siuishine over all,
Though here June's leafiest shadows
fall.
Young grass sprouts here. Look up !
the sky
Is veiled by woven greenery.
Fresh little folded leaves — the first.
And goldener than green, they burst
Their thick full biids and take the
breeze.
Here, when November stripped the
trees.
I came to wrestle with a grief:
Solace I sought not. nor relief.
I shed no tears, I craved no grace
I fain would see Giief face to face,
Fathom her awful eyes at length,
Measure my strength against her
strength,
I wondered why the Preacher saith.
"Like as the grass that witheretb.'"
LAZARUS.
The late, close blades still waved
around ;
Iclutolu'd a handful from the ground.
•' He mocks us cruelly," 1 said:
■'The frail herb lives and she is
dead."
1 lay dumb, sightless, deaf as she;
The long slow hours passed over me,
1 saw Grief face to face ; I know
The very form and traits of AVoe.
1 drained the galled dregs of the
draught
SJieottereduie: I could have laughed
in irony of sheer despair,
Although I could not weep. The air
Thickened with twilight shadows
dim:
I T'ose and left. I knew each limb
Of these great trees, each gnarled,
rough root
Piercing the clay, each cone of fruit
They bear in autumn.
What blooms here.
Filling the honeyed atmosphere
With faint, delicious f ragrancies,
Fj'eighted with blessed memories ?
The earliest March violet,
Dear as the image of Eegret,
And beautiful as Hope. Again
Past visions thrill and haunt my
brain.
Through tears I see the nodding head,
The }>urple and the green dispread.
Here, where I nursed despair that
morn.
The promise of fresh joy is l)orn,
Arrayed in sober colors still.
But piercing the gray mould to fill
With vague sweet influence the air,
'I'o lift the heart's dead weight of
care.
Longings and golden dreams to bring
Witii joyous phantasies of spring.
REMEMBEIi.
Remember Him, the only One.
Now, ere the years flow by, —
Now, wliile the smile is on thy lip.
The light within thine eye.
Now, ere for thee the sun have lost
Its glory and its light,
And earth rejoice thee not with
flowers.
Nor with the stai-s the night.
Now, while thou Invest earth, be-
cause
She is so wondrous fair
With daisies and witli prinnoses,
And sunlit, waving air:
And not because her bosom liolds
Thy dearest and thy best.
And some day will thyself infold
In calm and peaceful rest.
Now, while thou lovest violets.
Because mid grass they wave,
And not because they bloom upon
Some early-shapen grave.
Now, while thon lovest trembling
stars.
But just because they shine.
And not because they' re nearer one
Who never can be thine.
Now, while thou lovest music's
strains,
Because they cheer thy heart.
And not because from acliing eyes
They make the tear-drops start.
Now, whilst thou lovest all on earth
And deemest all will last.
Before thy hope is vanished quite ,
And every joy has past ;
Remember Him, the only One,
Before the days draw nigh
When thou shalt have no joy in
them.
And praying, yearn to die.
LEL AND. — LEY DEN.
Charles Godfrey Leland.
MINE OWS.
And oh, the longing, bm-ning eyes!
And oh, the gleaming hair
Which waves around me, night and
day,
O'er chamber, hall, and stair!
And oh, the step, half-dreamt, half
heard !
And oh, the laughter low !
And memories of merriment
Which faded long ago !
Oh, art thou Sylph, — or trvily Self, —
Or either at thy choice ?
Oh, speak in breeze or beating heart,
But let me hear thy voice!
'"Oh, some do call me Laughter, love;
And some do call me Sin:''
" And they may call thee what they
will,
So I thy love may win."
" Anil some do call me Wantonness,
And some ilo call me Play : ''
" Oh, they might call thee what they
would
If thou wert mine alway!"
" And some do call me Sorrow, love,
And some do call me Tears,
And some there be who name me
Hope,
And some that name me Fears.
" And some do call me Gentle Heart,
And some Forget fulness : * '
" And if thou com'stas one or all,
Thou comest but to bless! "
" And some do call me Life, sweet-
heart.
And some do call me Death ;
And he to whom the two are one
Has won my heart and faith."
She twined her white arms round his
neck : —
The tears fell down like rain.
" And if I live or if 1 die.
We'll never part again."
John Leyden.
ODE TO AN INDIAN COIN.
Slave of the dark and dirty mine!
What vanity has brouglit thee here?
How can 1 love to see thee shine
So bright, whom I have bought so
dear '? —
The tent-ropes Happing lone I hear,
For twilight converse, arm in arm ;
The jackal's shriek bursts on mine
ear
Whom mirth and music wont to
charm.
By Cherical's dark wandering streams.
Where cane-tufts shadow all the
wild.
Sweet visions haunt my waking
dreams
Of Teviot loved while still a child.
Of castled rocks stupendous piled
By Esk or Eden's classic wave,
Where loves of youth and friend-
ship smiled,
Uncursed by thee, vile yellow slave !
Fade, day-dreams sweet, from mem-
ory fade ! —
The perished bliss of youth's first
prime.
That once so bright on fancy played,
Kevives no more in after time.
Far from my sacred natal clime,
LODGE.
I haste to an untimely grave ;
The daring tlioughts that soared
sublime
Are sunk in ocean's southei'n wave,
Slave of the mine ! thy yellow light
Gleams baleful as the tomb-fire
drear.
A gentle vision comes by night
My lonely widowed heart to cheer;
Her eyes are dim witli many a tear,
That once were guiding stars to
mine:
Her fond heart throbs with many
a fear !
I cannot bear to see thee shine.
For thee, for thee, vile yellow slave,
I left a heart that loved me true !
I crossed the tedious ocean-wave,
To roam in climes unkind and new.
The cold wind of the stranger blew
Chill on my withered heart: the grave
Dark and untimely met my view, —
And all for thee, vile yellow slave !
Ha! comest thou now so late to
mock
A wanderer's banished heart for-
lorn.
Now that his frame the lightning
shock
Of sun-rays tipt with death has
borne ?
From love, from friendship, coun-
try, torn.
To memory's fond regrets the prey.
Vile slave, thy yellow dross I scorn I
Go mix thee with thy kindred clay!
Thomas Lodge.
ROSALINE.
Like to the clear in highest sphere,
Wliere all imperial glory shines.
Of self-same color is her hair,
Whether unfolded or in twines :
Her eyes are sapphires set in snow,
Refining heaven by every winlc ;
The gods do fear when as they glow,
And I do tremble when I think.
Her
lilce the blushinc
cheeks are
cloud,
That beautifies Aurora's face;
Or nice the silver crimson sliroud,
That Phoebus' smiling looks doth
grace.
Her lips are like two budded roses,
Wlioni ranks of lilies neighbor
nigh;
Within which bounds she balm en-
closes,
Apt to entice a deity.
Her neck like to a stately tower,
Where love himself imprisoned lies,
To watch for glances, every hour.
From her divine and sacred eyes.
With orient pearl, with ruby red,
Witli marble white, with sappliire
blue.
Her body everywhere is fed.
Yet soil in touch and sweet in vie\\ .
Nature herself her shape admires;
The gods are wounded in her sight;
And Love forsakes his heavenly fires.
And at her eyes his brand doth
light.
L GAN — L ONOFELL 0\V
341
John Logan.
THE CUCKOO.
Hail, beauteous stranger of the
grove !
Thou messenger of spring !
Xow heaven repairs thy rural seat.
And woods thy welcome sing.
Soon as the daisy decks the green,
Thy certain voice we hear.
Hast thou a star to guide thy path,
Or mark the rolling year '>
Delightful visitant ! with thee
I hail the time of flowers,
And hear the sound of music sweet
From birds among the bowers.
The schoolboy, wandering through
the wood
To pull the primrose gay,
Starts thy most ciu-ious voice to hear.
And imitates thy lay.
What time the pea puts on the bloom.
Thou fliest thy vocal vale,
An annual guest in other lands,
Another spring to hail.
Sweet bird! thy bower is ever green.
Thy sky is ever clear;
Thou hast no sorrow in thy sonc.
No winter in thy year!
Oh, could I fly, I'd fly with thee!
We'd make with joyful wing.
Our annual visit o'er the globe,
Attendants on the spring.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
THE LADDElt OF ST. AUGUSTIKE.
Saint Aucustine ! well hast thou
said.
That of our vices we can frame
A ladder, if we will but tread
Beneath our feet each deed of
shame !
All common things, each day's
events.
That with the hour begin and end.
Our pleasures and our discontents,
Are rounds by which we may as-
cend.
The low desire, the base design,
That makes another's virtues less:
The revel of the ruddy wine,
And all occasions of excess:
The longing for ignoble things:
The strife for triumph more than
truth ;
The hardening of the heart, that
brings
Irreverence for the dreams of vouth :
All thoughts of ill: all evil deeds.
That have their root in thoughts of
ill:
AVhatever hinders or impedes
The action of the nobler will; —
All these must first be trampled
down
Beneath our feet, if we would gain
In the bright fields of fair renown
The right of eminent domain.
We have not wings, we cannot soar :
But we have feet to scale and climb
By slow degrees, by more and more.
The cloudy summits of our time.
The mighty pyramids of stone
That wedge-like cleave the desert
airs.
When nearer seen, and better known.
Are but gigantic flights of stairs.
The distant mountains, that uprear
Their solid bastions to the skies.
Are crossed by pathways, that appear
As we to hisrher bn-els rise.
im.
The heights by great men reached
and kept
Were not attained by sndden fliglit,
But tliey, while tlieir companions
slept,
Were toiling upward in the night.
Standing on what too long we bore
With shovdders bent and downcast
eyes.
We may discern — unsecMi before —
A laath to higher destinies.
Nor deem the irrevocable Past
As wholly wasted, wholly vain,
If, rising on its wrecks, at last,
To somethinsr nobler we attain.
WEARINESS.
O LITTLE feet ! that such long years
Must wander on through hopes and
fears
Must ache and bleed beneath your
load ;
I, nearer to the wayside inn
Where toil shall cease, and rest begin.
Am weary, thinking of your road.
O little hands ! that weak or strong.
Have still to serve or rule so long,
Have still so long to give or ask;
1, who so much witli book and pen
Have toiled among my fellow-men.
Am weary, thinking of your task.
O little hearts I that throb and beat
With sucli impatient, feverish heat,
Such limitless and strong desires ;
Mine that so long has glowed and
burned.
With passions into ashes turned
Now covers and conceals its fires,
O little souls ! as piu'c and white
And ciystalline as rays of light
Direct from heaven, their source
divine;
Refracted through the mist of years.
How red my setting sun appears,
How lurid looks this soul of mine!
THE MEETING.
Afteh so long an absence
■ At last we meet again ;
Does the meeting give us pleasure,
Or does it give us pain?
The tree of life has been shaken,
And but few of us linger now,
Like the Prophet's two or three ber-
ries
In the top of the uppermost bough.
We cordially greet each other
In the old familiar tone :
And ^ve think, though we ilo not say
it,
How old and gray he is grown I
We speak of a Merry Christmas,
And many a happy New Year;
But each in his heart is flunking
Of those that are not here.
We speak of friends and their for-
tunes.
And of what they did and said,
Till the ilead alone seem living.
And the living alone seem dead.
And at last we hardly distinguish
Between the ghosts and the guests ;
And a mist and shadow of sadness
Steals over our merriest jests.
ST A Y, ST A Y AT HOME, MY HEART,
AND REST.
Stay, stay at home, my heart, and
rest ;
Home-keeping hearts are happiest.
For those that wander they know not
where
Are full of trouble and full of care ;
To stay at home is best.
Weary and homesick and distressed,
They wander east, they wander west.
And are ballled and beaten and blown
about
By the winds of tlni wilderness of
doubt ;
To stay at home is best.
i>^
■^^SSfe
MAIDEN AND WEATHERCOCK.
Page 343.
LOlsGFELLOW
y>A:i
Then stay at home, my heart, and
rest :
The bird is safest in its nest;
O'er all that flutter their wings and
%,
A hawk is hovering in the sky :
To stay at home is best.
NATURE.
As a fond mother, when the day is
o'er,
Leads liy the hand her little child
to bed,
Half-willing, half-reluctant to be
led,
Anil leave his broken j)Iaythings on
the floor.
Still gazing at them through the open
door ;
Nor wholly reassured and com-
forted
By promises of others in their
stead,
Which, though more splendid, may
not please him more ;
So Nature deals with us, and takes
away
Our playthings one by one, and by
the hand
Leads us to rest so gently, that we
go
Scarce knowing if we wish to go or
stay.
Being too full of sleep to under-
stand
How far the unknown transcends
the what we know.
THFJ TIDES.
I SAW the long line of the vacant
shore,
The sea-weed and the shells upon
the sand,
And the brown rocks left bare on
every hand,
As if the ebbing tide would flow no
more.
Then heard I, more distinctly than
before.
The ocean breathe, and its great
breast expand ;
And hurrying came on the defence-
less land
The insurgent waters with tumul-
tuous roar.
All thought and feeling and desire, I
said,
Love, laughter, and the exultant
joy of song.
Have ebbed from me forever! Suii-
denly o'er me
They swept again from their deep
ocean-bed,
And in a tumult of delight, and
strong
As youth, and beautiful as youth,
ujibore me.
MAIDEN AND WEATHERCOCK,
MAIDEN.
Weatuercock on the village
spire.
With your golden feathers all on
fire,
Tell me, what can you see from your
perch
Above there over the tower of t\\c.
church ?
WEATHEnCOCK.
1 can see the roofs and the streets be-
low.
And the people moving to and fro,
And beyond, without "either roof or
street,
The great salt sea, and the fisher-
man's fleet.
I can see a ship come sailing in
Beyond the headlands and harbor of
Lynn,
And a young man standing on the
deck.
With a silken kerchief round his
neck.
Now lie is pressing it to his lips,
And now he is kissing his fingei-tips,
344
LONOFELLOW.
And now he is lifting and waving his
hand,
And blowing the kisses toward the
land.
Ah ! that is the ship from over the sea.
That is bringing my lover back to m»_\
Bringing my lover so fond and true,
Wlu) does not change with the wind
like you.
AVP:ATnERCOCK.
If I change with all the winds that
blow.
It is only because they made me so,
And people would think it wondrous
strange,
If f, a weathercock, should not
change.
O pretty maiden, so fine and fair.
With your dreamy eyes and your
golden hair,
■WHien you and your lover meet to-
day
You will thank me for looking some
other way !
THREE FRIENDS OF MINE.
The doors are all wide open; at the
gate
The blossomed lilacs counterfeit a
blaze.
And seem to warm the air; a
dreamy haze
Hangs o'er the Brighton meadows
like a fate;
And on their margin, with sea-tides
elate.
The flooded Charles, as in the hap-
pier days.
Writes the last letter of his name,
and stays
His restless steps, as if compelled
to wait.
1 also wait; but they will come no
more,
Those friends of mine, whose pres-
ence satisfied
The thirst and hunger of my heart.
Ah me I
They have forgotten the pathway to
my door!
Something is gone from nature
since they died.
And svnnmer is not sunnner, nor
can be.
THE TWO ANGELS.
Two angels, one of Life and one of
Death,
Passed o'er our village as the morn-
ing broke;
The daA\n was on their faces, and
beneath.
The sombre houses hearsed with
plumes of smoke.
Their attitude and aspect were the
same.
Alike their featui'es and their robes
of white.
But one was crowned with amaranth
as with flame.
And one with asphodels, like flakes
of light.
I saw them pause on their celestial
way:
Then said I, with deep fear and
doubt oppressed.
"Beat not so loud, my heart, lost
thou betray
The place where thy beloved are at
rest!"
And he who wore the crown of as-
phodels.
Descending, at my door began to
knock.
And my soul sank within me, as in
wells
The waters sink before an earth-
quake's shock.
I recognized the nameless agony.
The terror and the tremor and the
pain.
That oft before had filled or haunted
me.
And now retiu-ned with threefold
strength again.
LONGFELLOW.
345
The door I opened to my heavenly
guest.
And listened, for I thought I heard
God's voice;
And, knowing whatsoe'er he sent
was best,
Dared neither to lament nor to re-
joice.
Then with a smile, that tilled the
house with light,
" My errand is not Death, but
Life," he said;
And ere he answered, passing out of
sight.
On his celestial embassy he sped.
'Twas at thy door, O friend, and not
at mine.
The angel with the amaranthine
wreath.
Pausing, descended, and with voice
divine,
Whispered a word that hail a sound
Mice death.
Then fell upon the house a sudden
gloom,
A shadow on those features fair
and thin ;
And softly from that hushed and
darkened room.
Two angels issued, where but one
went in.
All is of (4od! If He but wave his
hand.
The mists collect, the rain falls
thick and loud.
Till, with a smile of light on sea and
land,
Lo! He looks back from the de-
parting cloud.
Angels of Life and Death alike are
His;
Without His leave, they pass no
threshold o'er;
Who, then, would wish or dare, be-
lieving this.
Against His messengers to shut the
door ?
A DAY OF SUNSHINE.
GIFT of God ! O perfect day:
Whereon shall no man work, but
play
Whereon it is enough for me,
Not to be doing, but to be !
Through every fibre of my brain.
Through every nerve, through every
vein,
1 feel the electric thrill, the touch
Of life, that seems almost too much.
I hear the wind among the trees
Playing celestial symplionies;
I see the branches downward bent.
Like keys of some great instrument.
And over me unrolls on high
The splendid scenery of the sky.
Where through a sapphire sea, the
sun
Sails like a golden galleon.
Towards yonder cloud-lands in the
west.
Towards yonder Islands of the Blest,
Whose steep sierra far uplifts
Its craggy summits white with drifts.
Blow, winds! and waft through all
the rooms
The snow-flakes of the cherry-
blooms !
Blow, winds! and bend within my
reach
The fiery blossoms of the peach !
O Life and Love ! O happy throng
Of thoughts, whose only speech is
song!
( ) heart of man ! canst thou not be
Blithe as the air is, and as free ?
34(3
L ONOFELL OW—LO VELA CE.
Samuel Longfellow.
FROM MIRE TO BLOSSOM.
NOVEMBEi;.
The dead leaves, their rich mosaics
Of olive and gold and brown,
Had laid on the rain-wet pavement,
Through all the embowered town.
They were washed by the autumn
tempest,
They were trod by hurrying feet.
And the maids came out with their
besoms
And swept them into the street,
To be crushed and lost forever,
'Neath the wheels in the black
nnre lost;
The .Summer's precious darlings.
She nurtured at such cost !
O words that have fallen from me!
O golden thoughts and true !
Must I see in the leaves, a symbol
Of the fate which avvaiteth you ?
Again has come the spring-time,
\Vjth the crocus's golden bloom,
With the smell of the fresh-turned
earth-mould.
And the violet's perfume.
O gardener I tell me the secret
Of thy flowers so rare and sweet I
" I have only enriched my garden
With the black mire from the
street!"
Richard Lovelace.
TO LUC AST A, ON GOING BEYOND
THE SEAS.
If to be absent Avere to be
Away from thee ;
Or that \\hen I am gone
You or I were alone ;
Then, my Lucasta, might I crave
Pity from blustering wind, or swal-
lowing wave.
Though seas and land betwixt us
"both.
Our faith and troth.
Like separated souls,
All time and space controls :
Above the highest sphere we meet
Unseen, unknown, and greet as an-
gels greet.
So then we do anticipate
Our after-fate.
And are alive in the skies,
If thus our lips and eyes
Can speak like spirits unconfined
In heaven, their earthly bodies left
behind.
TO LUCASTA, ON GOING TO THE
WARS.
Teli. me not, sweet, I am inikind.
That from the nunnery
Of thy chaste breast and quiet mind,
To war and arms I fly.
True, a new mistress now I chase,
The first foe in the field ;
And with a stronger faith embrace
A sword, a horse, a shield.
Yet this inconstancy is such
As you, too, shall adore,
I could not love thee, dear, so much,
Loved 1 not honor moi'e.
LOVER.
ni
Samuel Lover.
on; WATCH YOU WEI J. BY DAY-
LIGHT.
Oil ! watch you well by daylight,
By daylight may you fear,
But keep no watch in darkness —
The angels then are near;
For Heaven the sense bestoweth,
Our waking lite to keep,
But tender mercy showeth,
To guard us in our sleep.
Then watch you well by daylight.
By daylight may you fear,
But keep no watch in darkness —
The angels then are near.
Oh ! watch you well in pleasure —
For pleasure oft betrays.
But keep no watch in sorrow,
When joy withdraws its rays :
For in the hour of sorrow,
As in the darkness drear.
To Heaven entrust the morrow.
For the angels then are near.
O watch you well by daylight.
By daylight may you fear,
But keep no watch in darkness —
The angels then are near.
THE CHILD AND THE AUTUMN
LEAF.
Down by the river's bank I strayed
Upon an autumn day ;
Beside the fading forest there,
I saw a child at play.
She played among the yellow leaves —
The leaves that once were green.
And flung upon the passing stream
What once had blooming been:
Oh ! deeply did it touch my lieart
To see that child at play;
It was the sweet imconscious sport
Of childhood with decay.
Fair child, if by this stream you
stray.
When after years go by.
The scene that makes thy childhood's
sport.
May wake thy age's sigh:
AVhen fast you see around you fall
iMie summer's leafy pride.
And mark the river hurrying on
Its ne'er retm-ning tide;
Then may you feel in pensive mood
That life's a summer di-eani;
And man, at last, forgotten falls —
A leaf ui)on the stream.
THE ANGErS WING.
When by the evening's quiet light
There sit two silent lovers.
They say, while in such tranquil
plight,
An angel round them hovers ;
And further still old legends tell, —
The first who breaks the silent spell,
To say a soft and pleasing thing.
Hath felt the passing angel's wing!
Thus, a musing minstrel strayed
By the sinnmer ocean.
Gazing on a lovely maid.
With a bard's devotion: —
Yet this love he never spoke,
Till now the silent spell he broke; —
The hidden lire to flame did spring,
Fanned by the passing angel's wing!
" I have loved thee well and long.
With love of heaven's own mak-
ing ! —
This is not a poet's song.
But a true heart's speaking, —
I will love thee, still, untired!"
He felt — he spoke — as one inspired,
The words did from Truth's foun-
tain spring.
Upwaken'd by the angel's wing.
Silence o'er the maiden fell.
Her beauty lovelier making: —
And by her blush, he knew full well
The dawn of love was breaking.
It came like siuishine o'er his heart!
He felt that they should never ])art.
She spoke — and oh! — the lovely
thing
Had felt the passing angel's wing.
348
LOWELL.
YIELD NOT, THOU SAD ONE, TO
SIGHS.
Oil ! yield not, thou sad one, to
sighs.
Xor murmur at Destiny' s will.
Behold, for each pleasure that flies,
Another replacing it still.
Time's wing, were it all of onefeather.
Far slower would be in its flight :
The storm gives a charm to fine
weather,
And day would seem dark without
night.
Then yield not, thou sad one, to
sighs.
When ^\•e look on some lake that
repeats
The loveliness bounding its shore,
A breeze o'er the soft surface fleets.
And the mirror-like beauty is o'er.
But the breeze, ere it ruflled the deep.
Pervading the odorous bowers.
Awaken' d the flowers from their
sleep.
And wafted their sweets to be ours.
Then yield not, thou sad one, to
sighs.
Oh. blame not the change nor the
flight
Of our joys as they're passing away,
'Tis the swiftness and change give
delight — [stay.
They would pall if permitted to
More gaily they glitter in flying.
They perish in lustre still bright,
Like the hues of the dolphin, in dy-
ing.
Or the humming-bird's wing in its
flight.
Then yield not, thou sad one, to
sighs.
James Russell Lowell.
THE HERITAGE.
The rich man's son inherits lands.
And piles of brick, and stone, and
gold.
And he inherits soft white hands.
And tender flesh that fears the
cold,
Nor dares to wear a garment old ;
A heritage, it seems to me.
One scarce would wish to hold in fee.
The rich man's son inherits cares;
The bank may break, the factory
burn.
A breath may burst his bubble shares.
And soft white hands could hardly
earn
A living that would serve his turn;
A heritage, it seems to me.
One scarce would wish to hold in fee.
The rich man's son inherits wants.
His stomach craves for dainty
fare ;
With sated heart, he hears the
pants
Of toiling hinds with brown arms
bare.
And wearies in his easy-chair ;
A heritage, it seems to me.
One scarce would wish to hold in fee.
What doth the poor man's son in-
herit ?
Stout muscles and a sinewy heart,
A hardy frame, a hardier spirit;
King of two hands, he does his part
In evei-y useful toil and art ;
A heritage, it seems to me,
A king might wish to hold in fee.
What doth the poor man's son in-
herit ?
Wishes o'ci'joyed with humble
thin2;s,
A rank adjudged by toil-worn merit.
Content that from employment
springs.
M
LOWELL.
349
A heart that in his labor sings ;
A heritage, it seems to me,
A liing miglat wisli to hold in fee.
What doth the poor man's son in-
herit •?
A patience learned of being poor,
Courage, if sorrow come, to bear it,
A fellow-feeling that is sure
To make the outcast bless his door;
A heritage, it seems to me,
A king might wish to hold in fee.
O rich man's son! there is a toil
That with all others level stands;
Large charity doth never soil,
But only whiten, soft white liands,
This is the best crop from thy
lands ;
A heritage, it seems to me,
Worth being rich to hold in fee.
O poor man's son! scorn not thy
state ;
There is worse weariness than
thine,
In merely being ricli and great;
Toil only gives the soul to shine.
And makes rest fragrant and be-
nign;
A heritage, it seems to me.
Worth being poor to hold in fee.
Both, heirs to some six feet of sod,
Are equal in the earth at last;
Both, children of the same dear God,
Prove title to your heirship vast
By records of a well-filled past;
A heritage, it seems to me.
Well worth a life to hold in fee.
[From the Visio7i of Sir Laun/al.]
THE GENEROSITY OF NATURE.
Eaktii gets its price for what earth
gives us ;
Thebeggar is taxed for a corner to
die in,
The priest hath his fee who comes
and slirives us,
We bargain for the graves we lie in ;
At the devil's booth are all things
sold,
Each omice of dross costs its ounce of
gold;
For a cap and bells om* lives we
pay,
Bubbles we buy with a whole soul's
tasking:
'Tis heaven alone that is given
away,
'Tis only God may be had for the
asking.
No price is set on the lavish summer;
June may be had by the poorest
comer.
And what is so rare as a day in
June '?
Then, if ever, come perfect days;
Then Heaven tries the earth if it be
in tune.
And over it softly her warm ear
lays:
Whether we look, or whether we lis-
ten.
We hear life murmur or see it glisten;
Eveiy clod feels a stir of might.
An instinct within it that reaches
and towers.
And, groping blindly above it for
light.
Climbs to a soul in grass and flow-
ers:
The flush of life may well be seen
Thrilling back over hills and val-
leys;
The cowslij) startles in meadows
green.
The buttercup catches the sun in
its chalice.
And there's never a leaf nor a blade
too mean
To be some happy creature's j)al-
ace;
The little bird sits at his door in the
sun,
Atilt like a blossom among the
leaves.
And lets liis illumined being o'errun
With the deluge of summer it re-
ceives;
His mate feels the eggs beneath her
wings,
And the lieart in her dumb breast
flutters and sings ;
He sings to llie wide world, and she
to her nest, —
In tlie nice ear of Nature which song
is tlie best ?
Now is tlie high-tide of the year.
And whatever of life hath ebbed
away
ronies flooding back with a ripply
cheer.
Into every bare inlet and creek and
bay;
Now the heart is so full that a drop
overfills it,
We are happy now because God wills
it;
No matter how bari'en the past may
have been,
'Tis enough for us now that the
leaves are green ;
We sit in the warm shade and feel
right well
How the sap creeps up and the blos-
soms swell;
We may shut our eyes, but we cannot
help knowing [ing.
That skies are clear and grass is grow-
The breeze comes whispering in our
ear,
That dandelions are blossoming near,
'I'liat maize has sprouted, that
streams are flowing,
That the river is bluer than the sky.
That the robin is plastering his house
hard by ;
And if the breeze kept the good news
back.
For other couriers we should not lack ;
We could guess it all by yon heifer s
lowing, —
And hark ! how clear bold chanticleer.
Warmed with the new wine of the
year.
Tells all in his lusty crowing !
Joy comes, grief goes, we know not
how;
Everything is happy now.
Everything is upward striving;
'Tis as easy now for the heart to be
true
As foi' grass to be green or skies to be
blue, —
'Tis the natural way of living:
Who knows whither the clouds have
fled ?
In the unscarred lieaven they leave
no wake ;
And the eyes forget the tears they
have shed,
The heart forgets its sorrow and
ache.
AFTEn THE BUIUAL.
YF:f^, faith is a goodly anchor;
AVhen skies are sweet as a psalm.
At the bows it lolls so stalwart.
In bluff, broad-shouldered calm.
And when over breakers to leeward
The tattered surges are hurled.
It may keep our head to the tempest.
With its grip on the base of the
MO rid.
But, aftei' the shipMreck. tell me
AVhat help in its iron thews.
Still true to the broken hawser.
Deep down among sea-weed and
ooze?
In the breaking gulfs of sorrow,
When the helpless feet stretch out
And find in the deeps of darkness
No footing so solid as doubt.
Then better one spar of memory,
One broken plank of the i)ast.
That our human heart may cling to.
Though hopeless of shore at last!
To the spirit its splendid conjectures.
To the flesh its sweet despair,
Its tears o'er the thin-worn locket
With its anguish of deathless hair!
Immortal ? I feel it and know it,
Who doubts it of such as she ?
But tluit is the pang's verj' secret;
Immortal a^ay from me!
There's a narrow I'idge in the grave-
yard
Would scarce stay a child in his
race,
But to me and my thought, it is wider
Than the star-sown vague of space.
AUF WIEDER5EHEN. (TILL WE MEET AGAIN
Page 351.
I
LOWELL.
851
Your logic, my friend, is perfect.
Your uiorals most drearily true;
But, siuce the earth clashed ou her
coffin,
I keep hearing that, and not you.
Console if you will. 1 can bear it;
"Tis a well-meant alms of breath;
But not all the preaching since Adam
Has made death other than death.
It is pagan; but wait till you feel it;
That jar of our earth, that dull shock
When the ploughshare of deeper pas-
sion
Tears down to our primitive rock.
Communion in spirit I Forgive me !
But I, who am earthy and weak,
AVoukl give all my incomes from
dreamland
For a touch of her hand on my cheek.
That little shoe in the corner.
So worn and wrinkled and brown,
With its emptiness confutes jou,
.\.nd argues your wisdom down.
[From Under the Willoivs.]
JUNE.
Frank-hearted hostess of the field
and wood,
Gypsy, whose roof is every spreading
tree,
Jime is the pearl of our New England
year.
Still a surprisal, though expected
long.
Her coming startles. Long she lies
in wait,
Makes many a feint, peeps forth,
draws coyly back.
Then, from some southern ambush
in the sky.
With one great gush of blossom
storms the world.
A week ago tbe sparrow was divine ;
The blue-bird shifting his light load
of song
From post to post along the cheerless
fence.
Was as a rhymer ere the poet come :
But now, O rapture ! sunshine-winged
and voiced,
Pilje blown through by the warm
wild breath of the West,
Shepherding his soft droves of fleecy
cloud.
Gladness of woods, skies, waters all
in one.
The bobolink has come, and, like the
soul
Of the sweet season vocal in a bird,
Gurgles in ecstasy we know not what,
SavCf/Hne .' Dear June ! Noic God be
praised for June.
AUF WIEDEliSEHEX.
The little gate was reached at last,
Half liid in lilacs down the lane;
She pushed it wide, and, as she past,
A wistful look she backward cast.
And said. — ''Auf iciederse/ien .' "
With hand on latch, a vision white
Lingered reluctant, and again
Half doubting if she did aright.
Soft as the dews that fell that night,
She said,— ''Auf iciedersehen ! "
The lamp's clear gleam flits up the
stair;
I linger in delicious pain ;
Ah, in that chamber, whose rich air
To breathe in thought I scarcely
dare.
Thinks she, — '^Attfiviedersehen ! "
"Tis thirteen years; once more I
press
The turf that silences the lane ;
I hear the rustle of her dress,
I smell the lilacs, and — ah, yes,
1 hear "Aiif loiedersehen ! '''
Sweet piece of bashful maiden art !
The English words had seemed too
fain.
But these — they drew us heart to
heart.
Yet held us tenderly apart;
She said, — "Auf ifiedersehen ! ''
352
LOWELL.
STORM AT APPLEDOIiE.
How looks Appledore in a storm ?
I have seen it wlien its crags
seemed frantic,
Butting against tlie mad Atlantic,
When surge on surge would heap
enorme,
Cliffs of emerald topped with snow.
That lifted and lifted, and then let
go
A great white avalanche of thunder,
A grinding, blinding, deafening ire
Monadnock might have trembled un-
der ;
And the island, whose rock-roots
pierce below
To where they are warmed with
the central fire.
You could feel its granite fibres
racked.
As it seemed to plunge with a
shudder and thrill
Right at the breast of the swooping
hill.
And to rise again snorting a cataract
Of rage-froth from every cranny and
ledge,
While the sea drew its breath in
hoarse and deep.
And the next vast breaker curled its
edge.
Gathering itself for a mightier leap.
North, east, and south there are reef s
and breakers
You would never dream of in
smooth weather.
That toss and gore the sea for acres.
Bellowing and gnashing and snarl-
ing together;
Look northward, where Duck Island
lies.
And over its crown you will see arise.
Against a background of slaty skies,
A row of pillars still and white,
That c;linuuer, and then are out of
sight,
As if the moon should suddenly kiss.
While you crossed the gusty desert
by night.
The long colonnades of Persepolis;
Look southward for White Island
light,
The lantern stands ninety feet o'er
the tide;
There is (irst a half-mile of tumult
and fight.
Of dash and roar and tumble and
fright.
And surging bewilderment wild and
wide,
Wliere the breakers straggle left and
right,
Then a mile or more of rushing
sea,
And then the lighthouse slim and
lone;
And whenever the weight of ocean is
thrown
Full and fair on White Island head,
A great mist-jotun you will see
Lifting himself up silently
High and huge o'er the lighthouse
top,
With hands of wavering spray out-
spread,
Groping after the little tower.
That seems to shrink and shorten
and cower,
Till the monster's arms of a sudden
drop,
And silently and fruitlessly
He sinks again into the sea.
You, meanwhile, where drenched
you stand.
Awaken once more to the rush and
roar.
And on the rock-point tighten your
hand,
As you tiu'n and see a valley deep,
That was not there a moment be-
fore,
Suck rattling down between you and a
heap [fall
Of toppling billow, whose instant
Must sink the whole island once
for all ;
Or watch the silenter, stealthier seas
Feeling their way to you more and
more ;
If they once should clutch you high
as the knees.
They would whirl you down like a
sprig of kelp.
Beyond all reach of hope or help; —
And such in a storm is Appledore.
LYTE — LYTLE.
353
Henry Francis Lyte.
ABIDE WITH ME.
Abide with me! fast falls the even-
tide;
The darkness deepens; Lord, with
me abide !
When other lielpers fail, and com-
forts flee.
Help of the helpless, oh, abide with
me!
Swift to its close ebbs out life's little
day ;
Earth's joys grow dim; its glories
pass away ;
Change and decay in all ai'ound I see;
O Thon who changest not, abide with
Not a brief glance, I beg, a passing
word ;
But as Thou ihvelledst with Thy dis-
ciples. Lord,
Familiar, condescending, patient,
free,
Come, not to sojourn, but abide with
me!
Come not in terrors, as the King of
kings;
But kind and good, with healing in
Tliy wings;
Tears for all woes, a heart for every
plea;
Come, Friend of sinners, thus al)ide
with me!
Thou on my head in eaily youth didst
smile;
And, thougli rebellious and perverse
meanwliile,
Thou hast not left me, oft as 1 left
Thee.
On to the close. O Lord, abide with
me!
I need Thy presence every passing
hour :
What but Thy grace can foil tlie
tempter's power ?
Who like Thyself my guide and stay
can be ?
Through cloud and sunshine, oli,
abide with me!
I fear no foe, with Thee at hand to
bless :
Ills have no weight, and tears no bit-
terness :
Where is Death's sting? Where
Grave, thy victory ?
I triumph still," if Thoii abide with
me!
Hold, then. Thy cross before my
closing eyes!
Shine tlirough the gloom, and point
me to tlie skies!
Heaven's morning breaks, and earth's
vain shadows flee ;
In life and death, O Lord, abide with
me !
William Haines Lytle.
ANTONY TO CLEOPATRA.
I AM dying, Egypt, dying.
Ebbs the crimson life-tiile fast,
Aiid tlie dark Plutonian shadows
Gather on the evening blast;
Let thine arms, O Queen, enfold
me.
Hush thy sobs and bow thine ear;
Listen to tlie great heart-secrets.
Thou, and thou alone, nuist hear.
Though my scaned and veteran le-
gions
Bear their eagles high no more,
And my wrecked and scattered gal-
leys
Strew dark Actium's fatal shore,
Though no glittering guards surround
me.
Prompt to do their masters will,
I must perish like a Roman.
Die the great Triumvir still.
354
MACAULAY.
Let not Caesar's servile minions
Moclc the lion thus laid low;
"Twas no foeman's arm that felled
him, [blow :
'Twas his own that struck the
His, who pillowed on thy bosom,
Turned aside from glory's ray,
His who, drunk with tliy caresses.
Madly threw a world away.
Should the base plebeian rabble
Dare assail my name at Rome,
Where my noble spouse, Octavia,
Weeps within her widowed Iiome,
Seek her; say the gods bear witness —
Altars, augurs, circling wings —
That her blood, with mine commin-
gled, [kings.
Yet shall mount the throne of
As for thee, star-eyed Egyptian!
Glorious sorceress of the Nile !
Light the path to Stygian horrors
With the splendors of thy smile,
(five the C:esar crowns and arches.
Let his brow the laurel twine:
1 can scorn the Senate's triumphs,
Triumphing in love like thine.
1 am dying, Egj-pt, dying!
Hark ! " the insulting foeman's
cry.
They are coming — quick, my
chion !
Let me fi-ont them ere I die.
Ah ! no moi'e amid the battle
Shall my heart exvilting swell ;
Isis and Osiris guard thee !
Cleopatra — Rome — farewell !
fal-
ThoMas Babington Macaulay.
FROM THE LAY OF "■HORATIUS:
Laks Porsena of Clusium,
By the Nine Gods he swore
That the great house of Tarquin
Should suffer wrong no more.
By the Nine Gods he swore it,
And named a trysting-day,
And bade his messengers ride forth.
East and west and south and north.
To sununon his array.
East and west and south and north
Tlie messengers ride fast.
And tower and town and cottage
Have heard the trumpet's blast.
Shame on the false Etruscan
Who lingers in his home,
AVhen Porsena of ("lusium
Is on the march for Rome !
The horsemen and the footmen
Are pouring in amain
From many a stately market-place.
From many a fruitful i)lain.
From many a lonely hamlet.
Which, hid by beech and pine.
Like an eagle's nest hangs on the
crest
Of purple Apennine :
There be thirty chosen prophets.
The Avisest of the land.
Who always by Lars Porsena
Both morn and evening stand.
Evening and morn the Thirty
Have turned the verses o'er.
Traced from the right on linen white
By mighty seers of yore ;
And with one voice the Thirty
Have their glad answer given :
" Go forth, go forth, Lars Porsena;
Go forth, beloved of Heaven !
Go, and return in glory
To CHusium's royal dome.
And hang round Nurscia's altars
The golden shields of Rome ! ' '
And now hath every city
Sent up her tale of men ;
The foot are fourscore thousand,
The horse are thousands ten.
Before the gates of Sutrium
Is met the great array ;
A proinl man was Lars Porsena
Upon the trysting-day.
For all the Etruscan armies
Were ranged beneath liis eye,
And many a banished Roman,
And many a stout ally;
And with a mighty follow ing,
To join the muster, came
The Tusculan Mamilius,
Prince of the Latian name.
Now, from the rock Tari)eian,
Could the wan burghers spy
The line of blazing villages
Red in the midnight sky.
The Fathers of the City,
They sat all night and day.
For every hour some horseman came
AVith tidings of dismay.
To eastward and to westwartl
Have spread the Tuscan bands.
Nor house, nor fence, nor dovecote
In Crustumerium stands.
Verbenna down to Ostia
Hath wasted all the plain;
Astur hath stormed Janiculum,
And the stout guards are slain.
I wis, in all the Senate
There was no heart so bold
But sore it ached, and fast it beat,
When that ill news was told.
Forthwith up rose the Consul,
Up rose the Fathers all ;
In haste they girded up their gowns.
And hied them to the wall.
They held a council, standing
Before the River-gate;
Short time was there, ye well may
guess,
For musing or debate.
Out spake the Consul roundly :
" The bridge must straight go
down ;
For, since Janiculum is lost.
Naught else can save the town."
Just then a scout came flying.
All wild with haste and fear ;
" To arms! to arms! Sir Consul;
Lars Porsena is here."
On the low hills to westward
The Consul fixed his eye.
And saw the swarthy storm of dust
Rise fast along the sky.
And nearer fast and nearer
Doth the red whirlwind come ;
And louder still, and still more loud.
From underneath that rolling cloud,
Is heard the trumpets' war-note
proud.
The trampling and the hum.
And plainly and more i)lainly
Now through the gloom appears,
Far to left and far to right.
In broken gleams of dark-blue light,
The long array of helmets bright,
The long array of speai's.
Fast by the royal standard,
O'erlooking all the war,
Lars Porsena of Clusium
Sat in his ivory car.
By the right wheel rode Mamilius,
Prince of the Latian name ;
And by the left false Sextus,
That wrought the deed of shame.
But when the face of Sextus
Was seen among the foes,
A yell that rent the firmament
From all the town arose.
On the house-tops was no woman
But spat towards him and hissed,
No child but screamed out curses.
And shook its little fist.
But the Consul's brow was sad.
And the Consul's speech was low,
And darkly looked he at the wall,
And darkly at the foe:
" Their van will be upon us
Before the bridge goes down;
And if they once may win the bridge,
What hope to save the town '? ' '
Then out spake brave Horatius,
The Captain of the gate :
" To every man upon this earth
Death cometh soon or late.
And how can man die better
Than facing fearful odds
For the ashes of his fathers
And the temples of his gods ?
" And for the tender motlier
Who dandled him to rest,
And for tlie wife who nurses
His baby at lier breast,
And for tlie lioly maidens
Wlio feed tlie eternal flame, —
To save them from false hiextus
That wrought the deed of shame?
•• Hew down the bridge, Sir Consul,
\Vith ail the speed ye may;
I, with two more to help me,
AVill hold the foe in play.
In yon strait path a thousand
May well I)e stopped by three:
Now who will stand on either hand.
And keep the bridge with me'?"
Then out spake Spurius Lartius, —
A Ramnian proud was he:
'* Lo, I will stand at thy right hand.
And keep the bridge with thee."
And out spake strong Herminius, —
Of Titian blood was lie:
'• I will abide on thy left side.
And keep the bridge with thee."
" Horatius," quoth the Consul,
'■ As thou sayest so let it be."
And straight against that great array
Went forth the dauntless three.
For Romans in Rome's quarrel
Spared neither land nor gold.
Nor son nor wife, nor limb nor life.
In the brave days of old.
Then none was for a party —
Then all were for the state;
Then the great man helped the poor.
And the poor man loved the great;
Then lands were fairly portioned!
Then spoils were fairly sold:
'l"he Romans were like brothers
In the brave days of old.
Now Roman is to Roman
Mort! hateful than a foe.
And the trilmnes beard the liigh,
And the fathers grind the low.
As we wax hot in faction.
In battle we wax cold;
Wherefore men fight not as they
fought
In the brave days of old.
Now while the three were tightening
Their harness on their backs,
The Consul was the foremost man
To take in hand an axe;
And fathers, mixed with commons,
Seized hatchet, bar, and crow.
And smote upon tlie planks above.
And loosed the props below.
Meanwhile the Tuscan army,
Right glorious to behold,
Came flashing back the noonday
light,
Rank behind rank, like surges bright
Of a broad son of gold.
Four hundred trumpets sounded
A peal of warlike glee.
As that great host with measured
tread,
And spears advanced, and ensigns
spread.
Rolled slowly towards the bridge's
head.
Where stood the dauntless tlin c
The three stood calm and silent,
And looked upon the foes.
And a great shout of laughter
From all the vanguard rose;
And forth three chiefs came spurring
• Before that dee]) array;
To earth they sprang, their swords
they drew.
And lifted high their shields, and
flew
To win the narrow way.
Herminius smote down Aruns;
Lartius laid Ocnus low;
Right to the heart of Lausulus
Horatius sent a blow:
" lAe tiiere," he cried, " fell pirate!
No more, aghast and pale.
From Oslia's walls the crowd shall
mark
The track of thy destroying bark ;
No more Campania's hinds shall fly
To woods and caverns, when they spy
Thy thrice-accursed sail! "
MACAULAV
357
But now no sound of laughter
Was heard among the foes :
A wild and wrathful clamor
From all the vanguard rose.
Six spears" length from the entrance.
Halted tliat mighty mass,
And for a space no man came forth
To win the narrow pass.
But, hark! the cry is Astur:
And lo! the ranks divide;
And the great lord of Luna
Comes with his stately stride.
Upon his ample shoulders
Clangs loud the fourfold shield,
And inhis hand he shakes the brand
Which none but he can wield.
He smiled on those bold Romans,
A smile serene and high ;
He eyed the flinching Tuscans,
And scorn was In his eye.
Quoth he, " Th(> she-wolf's litter
Stands savagely at bay ;
But will ye dare to follow.
If Astur clears the way? "
Then, whirling up his broadsword
With both hands to the height.
He rushed against Iloratius.
And smote with all his might.
With shield and blade Horatius
Right deftly turned the blow.
The blow, though turned, came yet
too nigh;
It missed his hehn, but gashed his
thigh.
The Tuscans raised a joyful cry
To see the red blood flow.
He reeled, and on Herminius
He leaned one breathing-space.
Then, like a wild-cat mad with
wounds,
Sprang right at Astur's face.
Through teeth and skull and helmet
So lierce a thrust he sped, |out
The good sword stood a handbreadth
Behind the Tuscan's head.
And the great lord of Luna
Fell at that d(\idly stroke.
As falls on Mount Avernus
A thunder-smitten oak.
Far o'er the crashing forest
The giant arms lie spread;
And the pale augurs, nuittering low,
Gaze on the blasted head.
Yet one man for one moment
Strode out before the crowd;
Well known was he to all tlie Thre(>,
And they gave him greeting loud:
"Now welcome, welcome, Sextus!
Now welcome to thy home !
Why dost thou stay, and turn away ?
Here lies the road to Rome."
Thrice looked he at the city ;
Thrice looked he at the dead ;
And thrice came on in fury,
And thrice turned back in dread;
And, white with fear and hatred,
Scowled at the nai-row way
Where, wallowing in a pool of blood
The bravest Tuscans lay.
But meanwhile axe and lever
Have manfully been plied;
And now th(> bridge hangs tottering
Above the boiling tide.
" Come back, come back, Horatius! "
Loud cried the Fathers all —
" Back, Lartius! back, Herminius!
Back, ere the ruin fall! "
Back darted Spxnius Lartius —
Herminius darted back;
And, as they passed, beneath their
feet
They felt the timbers crack.
But when they turned their faces.
And on the farther shore
Saw brave Horatius stand alone,
They would have crossed once
mon>;
But with a crash like thunder
Fell every loosened beam.
And, like a dain, the mighty wreck
Lay right athwart the stream;
And a long shout of triumph
Rose from the walls of Rome,
As to the highest turret-tops
Was sjilashed the yellow foam.
And like a horse unbroken.
When first he feels the rein,
358
MACAULAV.
The furious river struggled hard,
And tossed his tawny mane,
And burst the curb, anil bounded,
Rejoicing to be free ;
And whirling down, in fierce career,
Battlement, and plank, and pier,
Rushed headlong to the sea.
Alone stood brave Horatlus,
IJut constant still in mind —
Thrice tliirty thousand foes before.
And the broad flood behind.
'"Down with him!" cried false
Sextus,
With a smile on his pale face;
'•Now yield thee," cried Lars Por-
sena,
' ' Now yield thee to our grace ! ' '
Round turned he, as not deigning
Tliose craven ranks to see :
Naught spake he to Lars Porsena,
To Sextus naught spake he ;
l>ut he saw on Palatinus
The white porch of his home ;
And he spake to the noble river
That rolls by the towers of Rome :
"O Tiber! Father Tiber!
To whom the Romans pray,
A Roman's life, a Roman's arms.
Take thou in charge this day!"
So he spake, and, speaking, sheathed
The good sword by his side,
And, with his harness on his back.
Plunged headlong in the tide.
No sovmd of joy or sorrow
Was heard from either bank,
But friends and foes in dumb sur-
prise.
With parted lips and straining eyes,
Stood gazing where he sank ;
And wlien above the surges
They saw his crest appear.
All Rome sent forth a rapturous cry,
And even the ranks of Tuscany
Could scarce forbear to cheer.
But fiercely ran the current.
Swollen high by months of rain ;
And fast his blood was flowing;
And he was sore in pain.
And heavy with his armor.
And spent with changing blows;
And oft they thought him sinking,
But still again he rose.
Never, I ween, did swimmer.
In sucli an evil case.
Struggle through such a raging
^ flood
Safe to the landing-place;
But his limbs were borne up bravely
By the brave heart within.
And our good father Tiber
Bare bravely up his chin.
"Curse on him!" quoth false Sex-
tus —
" Will not the villain drown ?
But for this stay, ere close of day
We should have sacked the town ! "
"Heaven help liim!" quoth Lars
Porsena,
" And bring him safe to shore;
For such a gallant feat of arms
Was never seen before."
And now he feels the bottom ;
Now on dry earth he stands;
Now round him throng the Fathers
To press his gory hands ;
And now, with shouts and clapping,
And noise of weeping loud.
He enters through the River-Gate.
Borne by the joyous crowil.
They gave him of the corn-land.
That was of i)ublic right.
As much as two strong oxen
Could plough from morn till
night;
And they made a molten image.
And set it up on high —
And there it stands unto this day
To witness if I lie.
It stands in the Comitium,
Plain for all folk to see, —
Horatius in his harness
Halting upon one knee;
And underneatli is written,
In letters all of gold.
How valiantly lie kept the bridge
In the brave days of old.
MAC DONALD.
359
George MacDonald.
THE BABY.
Where did you come from, baby
dear ?
Ont of the everywhere into here.
Where did you get those eyes so bhie?
Out of tlie sky as I came through.
What makes the light in them spar-
kle and spin ?
Some of the starry spikes left in.
Where did you get that little tear ?
1 found it waiting when I got here.
AVhat makes your forehead so smooth
and high '?
A soft hand stroked it as I went by.
What makes your cheek like a warm
white rose ?
I saw something better than any one
knows.
Whence that three-cornered smile of
bliss ?
Three angels gave me at once a kiss.
Where did you get this pearly ear ?
(rod spoke," and it came out to hear.
Wliere did you get those arms and
hands ?
Love made itself into bonds and
bands.
Feet, whence did you come, you dar-
ling things ?
From the^ same box as the cherub's
wings.
How did they all just come to be
you?
(Jod thought about me, and so I grew.
But how did you come to us, you
dear?
God thought about you, and so I am
here.
O LASSIE AYONT THE HILL.
O LASSIE ayont the hill !
Come ower the tap o' the hill,
Or roun' the neuk o' the hill,
For I want ye sair the nicht,
I'm needin' ye sair the nicht.
For I'm tired and sick o' mysel',
A body's sel' 's the sairest weicht, —
O lassie, come ower the hill!
Gin a body could be a thocht o' grace,
i\ nd no a sel' ava !
I'm sick o' my held, and my ban's
and my face.
An' my thochts and mysel' and a' ;
I'm sick o' the warl' and a' ;
The licht gangs by wi' a hiss ;
For thro' my een the sunbeams fa',
But my weary heart they miss.
lassie ayont the hill !
Come ower the tap o' the hill.
Or roun' the neuk o' the hill;
Bidena ayont the hill!
For gin ance I saw yer bonnie held,
And the sun licht o' yer hair,
The ghaist o' mysel' wad fa' doun
" deid;
1 wad be mysel' nae mair.
I wad be mysel' nae mair.
Filled o' the sole remeid ;
Slain by the arrows o' licht frae yer
hair,
Killed by yer body and held.
lassie ayont the hill, etc.
But gin ye lo'ed me ever sae sma'.
For the sake o' my bonnie dame.
Whan I cam' to life, as she gaed
awa',
1 could bide my body and name,
I micht bide by mysel, the weary
same ;
Aye setting up its held
Till I turn frae the claes that cover
my frame.
As gin they war roun' the deid.
O lassie ayont the hill, etc.
360
MACK.
But gin ye lo'ed me as I lo'e you,
I wad ring my ain deid knell ;
Mysel' watl vanish, shot through and
tlirougli
Wi' the shine o' yer sunny sel',
IJy the licht aneatli yer broo,
I wad dee to niyoel', and ring my bell,
And only live in you.
O lassie ayont the hill !
Come ower the tap o' the hill,
Or roun' the neuk o' the hill,
For I want ye sair the nicht,
I'm needin' ye sair the nicht,
P'or I'm tired and sick o' mysel',
A body's sel' 's the sairest vveicht, —
O lassie, come ower the hill I
Frances Laughton Mace.
EASTER MOIiNING.
Open the gates of the Temple ;
Spread branches of palm and of
bay;
Let not the spirits of nature
Alone declc the Conqueror's way.
While Spring from her death-sleep
arises,
And joyous His presence awaits,
While morning's smile lights up tlie
lieavens.
Open the Beautiful Gates.
He is here! The long watches are
over.
The stone from the grave rolled
away ;
" We shall sleep," was the sigh of the
midnight,
" We shall rise ! " is the song of to-
day.
O Music! no longer lamenting.
On pinions of tremulous llame.
Go soaring to meet the Beloved,
And swell the new song of His
fame!
The altar is snowy with blossoms,
'ilip font is a vase of pei-fmne.
On pillar and chancel are twining
Fresh garlands of eloquent bloom.
Christ is risen! with glad lips we
utter,
And far up the infinite height,
Archangels the ]ia;an re-echo.
And crown Him with Lilies of
Light:
ONLY IF A /TING.
Only waiting till the shadows
Are a little longer gi-own,
Only waiting till Ihj glimmer
Of the day's last beam is flown ;
Till the niglit of earth is faded
From this heart once full of day,
Till the dawn of Heaven is breaking
Through the twilight soft and gray.
Only waiting till the reapers
Have the last sheaf gathered home.
For the summer-time hath faded.
And the autumn winds are come.
Quickly, reapers ! gather quickly.
The last ripe hours of my heart,
For the bloom of life is withered.
And I hasten to depart.
Only waiting till the angels
Open wide the mystic gate,
At Avhose feet I long have lingered,
AVeaiy, poor, and desolate.
Even now I hear their footsteps
And their voices far away —
If they call me, I am waiting,
Only waiting to obey.
Only waiting till the shadows
Are a little longer grown —
Only waiting till the glimmer
Of the day's last beam is flown.
When from out the folded darkness
Holy, deathless stars shall rise.
By whose light, my soul will gladly
Wing her passage to the skies.
MACK A y.
801
THE HELIOTROPE.
SOMEWHEHE 'tis told that in an East-
ern land,
Clasped in the dull palm of a mum-
my's hand,
A few light seeds were found ; with
wondering eyes
And words of awe was lifted up the
prize.
And much they marvelled what could
he so dear
Of herb or flower as to be treasured
here ;
What sacred vow had made the dy-
ing keep
So close this token for his last, long
sleep.
None ever knew, but in the fresh,
warm earth
The cherished seeds sprang to a sec-
ond birth.
And, eloquent once more with love
and hope,
Burst into bloom the purple helio-
trope.
Embalmed perhaps with sorrow's
fiery tears.
Out of the silence of a thousand
years
It answered back the passion of the
past
With the pure breath of perfect peacii
at last.
O pulseless heart ! as ages pass, sleep
well!
The pun^le flower thy secret will not
tell,
But only to our eager quest reply —
" Love, memory, hope, like me can
never die !"
Charles Mackay.
THE CHILD AND THE MOUllSEUS.
A LITTLE child, beneath a tree.
Sat and chanted cheerily
A little song, a pleasant song,
Which was, — she sang it all tlay
long, —
" When the wind blows the blossoms
fall,
But a good God reigns over all! '"
There passed a lady by the way.
Moaning in the face of day:
There were tears upon her cheek.
Grief in her heart too great to speak;
Her husband died but yester-morn.
And left her in the world forlorn.
She stopped and listened to the cliild.
That look'd to Heaven, and, singing,
smiled ;
And saw not, for her own despair.
Another lady, young and fair.
Who, also passing, stopped to hear
The infant's anthem ringing clear.
Eor she, but few sad days before,
Had lost the little babe she bore;
And grief was heavy at her soul,
As that sweet memory o'er her stol(\
And showed how briglit had been the
past,
The pi'esent drear and overcast.
And as they stood beneath the tree,
Listening, soothed, and placidly,
A youth came by, whose sunken eyes,
Spake of a load of miseries;
And he, arrested like the twain.
Stopped to listen to tlie sti-ain.
Death had bowed the youthful head
Of his bride beloved, his bride unwed :
Her marriage robes were fitted on.
Her fair young face with blushes
shone.
When the Destroyer smote her low,
And left the lover to his woe.
And the.se three listened to the song
Silver-toned, and sweet, and strong,
362
MACKAV.
Which that child, the livelong day,
Chanted to itself in play:
'• When the wind blows, the blossoms
fall,
I5ut a good God reigns over all."
The widow's lips impulsive moved;
The mother's grief, though unre-
jjroved,
Softened, as her trembling tongue
Repeated what the infant sung;
And the sad lover, with a start.
Conned it over to his heart.
And though the child — if child it
were,
And not a serajih sitting there —
Was seen no more, the sorrowing
three
AVent on their way resignedly,
The song still ringing in their ears —
AVas it music of the spheres ?
Who shall tell ? They did not know.
But in tiie midst of deepest woe
The strain recurred when sorrow grew,
To warn them, and console them too:
" When the wind blows, the blossoms
fall,
But a good God reigns over all."
CLEON AXD I.
Cleon hath ten thousand acres,
Ne'er a one have I;
Cleon dwelleth in a palace.
In a cottage, I ;
Cleon hath a dozen fortunes.
Not a i^enny, I ;
Yet the poorer of the twain is
T'leon, and not I.
( leon, true, possesseth acres,
But the landscape, I;
Half the charms to me it yieldeth
Money cannot buy ;
Cleon harbors sloth and dulness,
Freshening vigor, I ;
He in velvet, I in fustian —
llicher man am I.
Cleon is a slave to grandeur,
Free as thought am I ;
Cleon fees a score of doctors,
Need of none have I ;
Wealth-surrounded, care-environed,
Cleon fears to die ;
Death may come — he'll find me
ready.
Happier man am I.
Cleon sees no charms in Nature,
In a daisy, I;
Cleon hears no anthems ringing
'Twixt tlie sea and sky;
Nature sings to me forever,
Earnest listener, I ;
State for state, with all attendants —
Who would change ? — Not I.
CLEAR THE WAY!
Men of thought! be up and stirring.
Night and day:
Sow the seed — withdraw the cur-
tain —
Clear the way !
Men of action, aid and cheer them.
As ye may!
There's a fount about to stream.
There's a light about to beam.
There's a warmth about to glow.
There's a flower about to blow;
There's a midnight blackness chang-
ing
Into gray;
Men of thought and men of action.
Clear the way !
Once the welcome light has broken.
Who shall say
What the unimagined glories
Of the day ?
What the evil that shall perish
In its ray ?
Aid the dawning, tongue and pen ;
Aid It, hopes of honest men ;
Aid it, paper — aid it, type —
Aid it, for the hour is ripe.
And our earnest must not slacken
Into play.
Men of thought and men of action,
(."lear the wav !
MACKAV.
363
Lo ! a cloud 's about to vanish
From the day ;
And a brazen wrong to crumble
Into clay.
Lo! the Klght's about to conquer.
Clear the way !
With the Eight, shall many more
Enter, smiling, at the door ;
With the giaiit Wrong, shall fall
Many others, great and small.
That for ages long have held us
For their prey.
Men of thought and men of action,
Clear the ^^■ay !
THE GOOD TIME COyflXG.
There's a good time coming, boys,
A good time coming:
We may not live to see the day.
l>ut earth shall glisten in the ray
Of the good time coming.
Cannon-balls may aid the truth,
But thought's a weapon stronger;
We'll win our battle by its aid; —
Wait a little longer.
There's a good time coming, boys,
A good time coming:
'i'lie pen shall supersede the sword.
And Kiirht, not Might, shall be the
lord
In the good time coming.
Worth, not Birth, shall rule man-
kind.
And be acknowledged stronger;
'J'lic proper impulse has been given ; —
Wait a little longer.
There's a good time coming, boys,
A good time coming:
War, in all men's eyes, shall be
A monster of iniquity
In the good time coming.
Nations shall not quarrel then.
To prove which is the stronger;
Nor slaughter men for glory's sake ; —
Wait a little longer.
There's a good time coming, boys,
A good time coming:
Hateful rivalries of creed
Shall not make their martyrs bleed
In the good time coming.
Religion shall be shorn of pride.
And flourish all the stronger;
And Charity shall trim her lamp ; —
Wait a little longer.
There's a good time coming, boys,
A good time coming:
And a poor man's family
.Shall not be his misery
In the good time coming.
Every child shall be a help, #
To make his right arm stronger;
The happier he, the more he has; —
Wait a little longer.
There's a good time coming, boys,
A good time coming:
Little children shall not toil.
Under or above the soil.
In the good time coming;
But shall play in healthful fields
Till limbs and mind grow stronger;
And every one shall read and write ; —
Wait a little longer.
There's a good time coming, lioys,
A good time coming:
The people shall be temperate.
And shall love instead of hate.
In the good time coming.
They shall use, and not abuse.
And make all virtue stronger
The reformation has begun ;
Wait a little longer.
There's a good time coming, boys,
A good time coming:
Let us aid it all we can.
Every woman, every man.
The good time conung. ,
Smallest helps, if rightly given,
Make the impulse stronger;
'Twill be strong enough one day; —
Wait a little longer.
THE LIGHT IX THE WINDOW.
Late or early, home returning,
In the starlight or the rain,
I beheld that lonely candle
Shining from his window-pane.
Ever o'er his tattered curtain,
Nightly looliing, I could scan,
Aye inditing,
Writing — writing,
The pale tigure of a man ;
Still discern behind him fall
The same shadow on tlic wall.
P'ar beyond the murky midnight,
By dim burning of my oil.
Filling aye his rapid leaflets,
I have watcheil him at his toil;
AVatched his broad and seamy fore-
head,
Watched his white industiious hand.
Ever passing
And repassing:
Watched and strove to nntlerstand
What impelled it — gold, or fame —
Bread, or bubble of a name.
Oft I've asked, debating vainly
In the silence of my mind.
What the services he rendered
To his country or his kind;
Whether tones of ancient music,
Or the soimd of modern gong,
Wisdom holy,
Humors lowly,
Sermon, essay, novel, song.
Or philosophy sublime,
Fill'd the measure of his time.
No one sought him, no one knew
him,
Undistinguished was his name:
Never had his praise been uttered
By the oracles of fame.
Scanty fare and decent raiment,
IIuml)Ie lodging, and a fire —
These he sought for.
These he wrought for.
And he gained liis meek desire;
Teaching men by written word —
Clinging to a hope deferred.
So he lived. At last I missed him;
Still might evening twilight fall.
But no taper lit his lattice —
Lay no shadow on his wall.
In the winter of his seasons,
In the midnight of his day,
'Mid his writing,
And inditing,
Death hath beckoned him away,
Ere the sentence he had planned
Found completion at his hand.
But this ]nan so old and nameless
Left behind him projects large.
Schemes of progress undeveloped.
Worthy of a nation's charge;
Noble fancies uncompleted,
Germs of beauty immatured.
Only needing
Kindly feeding
To have nourished and endured ;
Meet reward in golden store
To have lived for evermore.
Who shall tell what schemes maji-stic
Perish in the active brain ?
What hmnanity is robbed of,
Ne'er to be restored again ?
What we lose, because we honor
Overmuch the mighty dead,
And dispirit
Living merit,
Heaping scorn upon its head ?
Or perchance, when kinder grown,
Leaving it to die — alone ?
o YE TEAns;
vp: tears I O ye tears ! that have long
refused to flow,
Ye are welcome to my heart — thaw-
ing, thawing, like the snow;
1 feel the hard cfod soften, and the
early snowdrops si)ring.
And the healing fountains gush, and
the wildernesses sing.
O ye tears ! O ye tears! I am thank-
ful that ye run :
Though ye trickle in the darkness, ye
shall glitter in the sun.
The rainbow cannot shine if the rain
refuse to fall.
And the eyes that cannot weep are
the saddest eyes of all.
ye tears ! O ye tears ! till I felt you
on my cheek.
1 was selfish in my sorrow, I was stub-
born, I was weak.
Ye have given me strength to conquer,
and I stand erect and free,
And know that 1 am hmuan by the
Hght of sympathy.
O ye tears ! O ye tears ! ye reheve me
of my pain ;
The barren rocic of i)ride has been
stricken once again:
Like tlie rock that Moses smote, amid
Horeb's burning sand.
It yields tlie flowing water to make
gladness in the land.
There is light upon my path, there is
svmsiune in my heart.
And the leaf and fruit of life shall
not utterly depart;
Ye restore to me the freshness and
the bloom of long ago —
O ye tears ! happy tears ! I am thank-
ful that ye flow !
A QUESTION ANSWERED.
What to do to make thy fame
Live beyond thee in the tomb ?
And thine honorable name
Shine, a star, tlnough history's
gloom ?
Seize the Spirit of thy Time.
Take the measure of his height,
Look into his eyes sublime.
And imbue thee with their light.
Know his words ere they are spoken,
And w ith utterance loud and clear,
Firm, persuasive, and unbroken.
Breathe them in the people's ear.
Think whate'er the Spirit thinks.
Feel thyself whate'er he feels.
Drink at "fountains where he drinks,
And reveal what he reveals.
And whate'erthy medium be.
Canvas, stone, or printed sheet.
Fiction, or philosophy,
Or a balla'l for the street ; —
Or, perchance, with passion fraught.
Spoken words, like lightnings
thrown.
Tell the people all thy thought,
And the world shall be thine own!
EXrUACT FROM 'M HE V ERIE IN
THE GRASS."
0]\, beautiful green grass! Earth-
covering fair!
What shall be sung of thee, nor bright,
nor rare,
INor highly thought of ? Long green
grass that ^\■aves
By the wayside, ovut hath its own winged mariners to give it melody:
Tliou seest their glittering fans outspread, all gleaming like red gold;
And hark! with shrill pipe musical, their merry course they hold.
God bless them all, those little ones, who, far above this earth,
('an make a scoff of its mean joys, and vent a nobler mirth.
Hut soft! mine ear upcaught a sound, — from yonder wood it came!
The spirit of the dim green glade did breathe his own glad name; —
Yes, it is he! the hermit bird, that, apart from all his kind.
Slow spells his beads monotonous to the soft western wind ;
Cuckoo! Cuckoo! he sings again, — his notes are void of art;
But simplest strains do soonest sound the deep founts of the heait.
Good Lord ! it is a gracious boon for thought-crazed wight like me.
To smell again these summer flowers beneath this summer tree!
To suck once more in every breath their little souls away,
And feed my fancy with fond dreams of youth's bright summer day.
When, rushing forth like untamed colt, the reckless, truant boy
Wandered through greenwoods all day long, a mighty heart of joy !
I'm sadder now — I have had cause; but oh! I'm proud to think
That each puiv joy-fount, loved of yore. I yet delight to drink: —
Leaf, blossom, blade, hill, valley, stream, the calm unclouded sky.
Still mingle music with my dreams, as in the days gone by.
When summer's loveliness and light fall round me dark and cold,
ril bear indeed life's heaviest curse, — a heart that hath waxed old I
Lady Caroline Nairn.
THE LAND O' THE LEAL.
I'm wearin' awa", Jean,
Like snaw-wreaths in tliaw, Jean;
I'm wearin' awa'
To the Land o' the Leal.
There's nae sorrow there, Jean ;
There's neither caidd nor care, Jean,
The day's aye fair
r the Land o" the Leal.
( )ur bonny bairn's there, Jean:
iSlie was baith gude and fair, Jean ;
And, oh! we grudged her sair
To the Land o' tlie Leal.
But sorrow's sel' wears past, Jean —
And joy's a-comin' fast, Jean, —
The joy that's aye to last
In the Land o' the Leal.
tSae dear's that joy was bought, Jean.
Sae free the battle fought, Jean,
That sinfu' man e'er brought
To the Land o' the Leal.
Oh, dry your glistening e'e, Jean!
My soul langs to be free, Jean;
And angels beckon nie
To the Land o' the Leal.
Oh, baud ye leal and true, Jean!
Your day it's wearin' through, Jean:
And I'll welcome you
To the Land o' the Leal.
Now, fare-ye-well, my ain Jean.
This warld's cares are vain, Jean:
AVe'Il meet, and we'll be fain,
In the Land o' the Leal.
William Newell.
SERVE GOD AND BE CHEERFUL.
•' Serve God and be cheerful." The
motto
.Shall be mine, as the bishop'^ of
old;
On my soul's coat-of-arms, I will
write it
In letters of azure and gold.
"Serve God and be cheerful," .self-
balanced,
Whether Fortune smile sweetly or
frown.
Christ stood king before Pilate.
Within me
1 carry the sceptre and crown.
" Serve God and be cheerful." Make
brighter
The brightness that falls to your
lot;
The rare or the daily-sent blessing.
Profane not with gloom and with
doubt.
" Serve God and be cheerful." Each
sorrow
Is — with your will in God's — for
the best,
0"er the cloud hangs the rainbow.
To-morrow
AVMll see the blue sky in the west.
"Serve God and be cheerful." The
darkness
Only masks the surprises of dawn;
And the deeper and grlnnnei- the
midnight,
The brighter and sweeter the morn.
"Serve God and be cheerful."" The
winter
Rolls round to the beautiful s]iring,
And in the green grave of the snow-
drift
The nest-building robins will sing.
" Serve God and be cheerful.'" Look
upward! [gloom:
God's countenance scatters the
And the soft summer light of II is
heaven
Shines over the cross and the tomb.
"Serve God and be cheerfid."" The
wrinkles
Of age we may take with a smile :
But the wrinkles of faithless fore-
boding [guile.
Are the crow's feet of Beelzebub's
" Serve God and be cheerful." Relig-
ion
Looks all the more lovely in white:
And God is best served by His servant
When, smiling, he serves in the
light;
396
NEWMAN— NORTON.
And lives out the glad tidings of
Jesus
In the sunshine He came to im-
part.
For tlie fruit of His word and His
8pirit
"•Is love, joy and peace" in the
heart.
" Serve God and be cheerful." Live
nobly.
Do right and do good. Make the
best
Of the gifts and the work put before
you,
And to God, without fear, leave the
rest.
John Henry Newman
A VOICE FROM AFAH.
Wkep not for me ; —
Be blithe as wont, nor tinge with
gloom
The stream of love that circles home,
Light hearts and free!
Joy in the gifts Heaven's bounty
lends ;
Nor miss my face, dear friends!
I still am near; —
Watching the smiles 1 prized on
earth ; mirth ;
Your converse mild, your blameless
Now, too, I hear
Of whispered sounds the tale com-
plete.
Low prayers and music sweet.
A sea before
The Tlirone is spread : — its pure still
glass
Pictures all earth-scenes as they pass.
AVe, on its shore.
Share, in the bosom of our rest.
God's knowledge, and are blessed.
FLOWERS WITHOUT FRUIT.
Prune thou thy words, the thoughts
control
That o'er thee swell and throng:
They will condense within thy soul.
And change to purpose strong.
But he who lets his feelings run
In soft luxurious flow.
Shrinks A\hen hard service must be
done.
And faints at every woe.
Faith's meanest deed more favor
bears.
When hearts and wills are weighed.
Than highest transport's choicest
prayei-s.
Which bloom their hour and fade.
Andrews Norton.
SCENE AFTER A SUMMER SHO WER.
The rain is o'er. How dense and
bright
Yon pearly clouds reposing lie!
Cloud above cloud, a glorious sight.
Contrasting with the dark blue
sky!
In grateful silence earth receives
The general blessing ; fresh and fair.
Each flower expands its little leaves,
As glad the common joy to share.
The softened sunbeams pour around
A fairy light, uncertain, pale;
NORTON.
397
The wind blows cool; the scented
ground
Is breathin" odors on the iiale.
Mid yon rich clouds' voluptuous
pile,
Methinks some spirit of the air
Might rest, to gaze below awhile.
Then turn to bathe and revel
there.
The sun breaks forth ; from off the
scene
Its floating veil of mist is flung;
And all the wilderness of green
With trembling drops of light is
huna.
Now gaze on nature, — yet the same;
Glowing with life, by breezes
fanned,
Luxuriant, lovely, as she came,
Fresh in her youtli, from (iod's own
hand.
Hear the rich music of that voice,
Which sounds from all below,
above ;
She calls her children to rejoice,
And round them throws her arms
of love.
Drink in her influence; low-born care,
And all the train of mean desire.
Refuse to breathe this holy air,
And mid this living light expire.
Caroline E. S. Norton.
BIXGEN ON THE RHIXE.
A SOLDIER of the Legion lay dying in Algiers,
There Avas lack of woman's nursing, there was dearth of woman's tears;
But a comrade stood beside him, while his lifeblood ebbed away.
And bent with pitying glances, to hear what he might say.
Tlie dying soldier faltered, and he took that comrade's hand.
And he said, " I nevermore shall see my own, my native land:
Take a message, and a token, to some distant friends of mine.
For I was born at Bingen, — at Bingen on the Rhine.
" Tell my brothers and companions, wlien they meet and crowd around.
To hear my mournful story, in the pleasant vineyard ground.
That we fought the battle bravely, and when the day" was done.
Full many a corse lay ghastly pale beneath the setting sim ;
And, mid the dead and dying, were some grown old in wars. —
The death- wound on their gallant breasts, the last of many scars;
And some v/ere young, and suddenly beheld life's morn decline, —
And one had come from Bingen, — fair Bingen on the Rhine.
" Tell my mother that her other son shall comfort her old age;
For I was still a truant bird, that thought his home a cage.
For my father was a soldier, and even as a child
My heart leaped forth to hear him tell of struggles fierce and wild ;
And when he died, and left us to divide his scanty hoard,
I let them take whate'er they would, — but kept my father's sword;
And with boyish love I hung it where the bright light used to shine
On the cottage wall at Bingen, — calm Bingen on the Rhine.
THE RIDE OF COLLINS GRAVES.
Page 399.
O'REILLY.
399
John Boyle O'Reilly.
PEACE AXn PAIA\
Thk day and night are symbols of
creation,
And each has part in all that God
has made:
Tliere is no ill without its compen-
sation.
And life and death are only light
and shade.
There never beat a heart so base and
sordid
But felt at times a sympathetic
glow; " [ed,
Tliere never lived a virtue unreward-
Xor died a vice without its meed of
woe.
In this brief life despair should never
reach us;
The sea looks wide because the
shores are dim;
The star that led the Magi still can
teach us
The way to go if we but look to Him.
And as we wade, the darkness clos-
ing o'er us,
The lumgry waters surging to the
chin.
Our deeds will rise like stepping-
stones before us —
The good and bad — for we may
use the sin.
A sin of youth, atoned for and for-
given,
Takes on a virtue, if we choose to
find:
When clouds across our onward path
are driven,
We still may steer by its pale light
behind.
A sin forgotten is in part to pay for,
A sin remembered is a constant
gain :
Sorrow, next joy, is what we ought
to pray for.
As next to peace we profit most
from pain.
THE HIDE OF COLLINS GRAVES.
No song of a soldier riding down
To the raging fight from Winchester
town ;
No song of a time that shook the
earth
With the nation's throe at a nation's
birth :
But the song of a brave man, free
from fear
As .Sheridan's self or Paul Revere;
Who risked what they risked, free
from strife.
And its promise of glorious pay — his
life!
The peaceful valley has waked and
stirred.
And the answering echoes of life are
heard :
The dew still clings to the trees and
grass,
And the early toilers smiling pass.
As they glance aside at the white-
walled homes.
Or up the valley where merrily comes
The brook that sparkles in diamond
rills
As the sun comes over the Hamp-
shire hills.
What was it that passed like an omi-
nous breath —
Like a shiver of fear or a touch of
death ?
What was it ? The valley is peace-
ful still.
And the leaves are afire on top of the
hill.
It was not a sound — nor a thing of
sense —
But a pain, like the pang of the
short suspense [see
That thrills tlie being of those who
At their feet the gulf "of Eternity !
400
a RE ILLY.
The air of the valley has felt the chill :
The workers j^ause at the door of the
mill;
The housewife, keen to the shiver-
ing air
Arrests her foot on the cottage stair,
Instinctive taught by the mother-
love,
And thinks of the sleeping ones
above.
Why start the listeners ? Why does
the course
( )f the mill-stream widen ? Is it a
horse —
Hark to the sound of his hoofs, they
say —
That gallops so wildly Williamsburg
Vay !
God! what was that, like a human
shriek
From the winding valley ? Will no-
body speak ?
"Will nobody answer those women
who cry
As the awful warnings thunder by ?
Whence come they ? Listen I And
now they hear
The sound of the galloping horse-
hoofs near;
They watch the trend of the vale,
and see [inglv,
The rider who thunders so menac-
With waving arms and warning
scream
To the home-filled banks of the val-
ley stream. [street
He draws no rein, but he shakes the
With a shout and the ring of the gal-
loping feet;
And this the cry he flings to the
wind :
"To the hills for your lives! The
flood is behind! "
He cries and is gone: but they know
the worst —
The breast of the Williamsburg dam
has burst!
The basin that nourished their happy
homes
Is changed to a demon. It comes!
it comes !
A monster in aspect, with shaggy
front,
Of shattered dwellings, to take the
brunt
Of the homes they shatter — white-
maned and hoarse.
The merciless Terror fills the course
Of the narrow valley, and rushing
raves.
With Death on the first of its hissing
waves, [mill
Till cottage and street and crowded
Are crumbled and crushed.
But onward still.
In front of the roaring flood is heard
The galloping horse and the warning
word.
Thank God! the brave man's life is
spared !
From Williamsburg town he nobly
dared
To race with the flood and take the
road
In front of the terrible swath it
mowed.
For miles it thundered and crashc.l
behind.
But he looked ahead with a steadfast
mind ;
" They must be warned! " was all he
said.
As away on his terrible ride he sped.
When heroes are called for, bring the
crown
To this Yankee rider: send him down
On the stream of time with the Cur-
tius old;
His deed as the Roman's was brAve
and bold,
And the tale can as noble a thrill
awake.
For he offered his life for the people's
sake.
FOUEVEn.
Those we love truly never die.
Though year by year the sad memo-
rial wreath,
A ring and flowers, types of life and
death.
Arc laid upon their graves.
O'REILLY.
401
For death the pure life saves,
And life all pure is love; and love
can reach
From heaven to earth, and nobler
lessons teach
Than those by mortals read.
Well blessed is he who has a dear
one dead ;
A friend he has whose face will never
change —
A dear companion that will not grow
strange ;
The anchor of a love is death.
Tlie blessed sweetness of a loving
breath
Will reach our cheek all fi-esh tlirough
weary years,
For her who died long since, ah!
waste not tears,
She's thine unto the end.
Tliank God for one dead friend,
With face still radiant with the light
of truth,
Wliose love comes laden with the
scent of youth,
Tiu-ough twenty years of death !
UifSPOKEiSr WOliDS.
The kindly words that rise within
tlie heart,
And thrill it witii their sympathetic
tone
But die ere spoken, fail to play their
part.
And claim a merit that is not their
own.
The kindly word unspoken is a sin,
A sin that wraps itself in purest
guise.
And telis the heart that, doubting,
looks within.
That not in speech, but thought,
the virtue lies.
Poor banished Hagar! — prayed a well
might burst
From out the santl to save her
parching child.
And loving eyes that cannot see the
mind
Will watch the expected movement
of the lip:
Ah! can ye let its cutting silence
wind
Around that heart, and scathe it
like a whip ?
Unspoken words, like treasmesin the
mine.
Are valueless until we give them
birth:
Like unfound gold their hidden beau-
ties shine.
Which God has made to bless and
gild the earth.
How sad 'twould be to see a masters
hand
Strike glorious notes upon a voice-
less lute !
But oh! what pain when, at God's
own oomniaiid,
A heaitstring thrills Milli kind-
ness, but is mute !
Then hide it not, the music of the
soul.
Dear sympathy, expressed with
kindly voice.
But let it like a shining river roll
To deserts dry, — to hearts that
woidd rejoice.
Oh! let the symphony of kindly
\\ords
Sound for the poor, the friendless,
and the weak;
And lie will liless you, — He who
struck these chords
Will strike another when in turn
you seek.
HIDDEN aiA.S.
But 'tis not so: another heart may FoK every sin that comes before the
thirst light.
For that kind word, as Hagar in And leaves an outward blemish on
the wild— ! the soul.
402
OSGOOD.
How many, darker, cower out of
siglit,
An 1 burrow, blind and silent, like
the mole.
And like the mole, too, with its busy
feet
That dig and dig a never-ending
cave,
Our hidden sins gnaw through the
soul, and meet
And feast upon each other in its
grave.
Frances Sargent Osgood.
LABORAHE EST OR ARE.
PAtJSE not to dream of the future
before us ;
Pause not to weep the wild cares
that come o'er us;
Hark, how Creation's deep, musical
chorus,
Unintermitting, goes up into
heaven !
Never the ocean wave falters in flow-
ing;
Never the little seed stops in its
growing;
More and more richly the rose heart
keeps glowing.
Till from its nourishing stem it is
riven.
"Labor is worship!" — the robin is
singing;
"• Labor is worship! " — the wild bee
is ringing;
Listen! tliat eloquent whisper, up-
springing.
Speaks to thy soul from out Na-
ture's great heart.
From the dark cloud flows the life-
giving shower;
From the rough sod blows the soft-
breathing flower;
From the small insect, the rich coral
bower;
Only man shrinks, in the plan,
from his part.
Labor is life! — 'Tis the still water
faileth ;
Idleness ever despaireth, bewaileth;
Keep the watch wound, for the dark
rust assailetli !
Flowers droop and die in the still-
ness of noon.
Labor is glory! — the flying cloud
lightens ;
Only the waving wing changes and
brightens ;
Idle hearts only the dark future
frightens ;
Play the sweet keys, wouldst thou
keep them in tune!
Labor is rest, — from the sorrows that
greet us;
Rest from all petty vexations that
meet us,
Rest from sin-promptings that ever
entreat us.
Rest from world-sirens that lure us
to ill.
Work, — and pure slumbers shall
wait on thy pillow;
Work. — thou shalt ride over Care's
coming billow:
Lie not down wearied 'neatli Woe's
weeping-willow!
Work with a stout heart and reso-
lute will !
Labor is health, — lo! the husband-
man reaping,
How through his veins goes the life-
current leaping !
How his strong arm in his stalwart
pride sweeping.
True as a sunbeam the swift sickle
guides.
Labor is wealth, — in the sea the
pearl groweth :
Rich the queen's robe from the frail
cocoon floweth;
From the fine acorn the strong forest
bloweth ;
Temple and statue the marble
block hides.
Droop not, though shame, sin, and
anguisli are round thee !
Bravely tling off the cold chain that
iiatli bound thee !
liOok to yon pure heaven sinihng be-
yond thee!
Rest not content in thy darkness,
— a clod!
Work — for some good, be it ever so
slowly;
Cherish some flower, be it ever so
lowly :
Labor ! — all labor is noble and
holy:
Let thy great deeds be thy prayer
to thy God.
Kate Putnam Osgood.
BEFORE THE PRIME.
You think you love me. Marguerite,
Because you find Love's fancy sweet;
So, zealously, you seek a sign
To prove your heart is wliolly mine.
Ah, were it so! But listen, dear!
Bethink you how, this very year,
AVi;h fond impatience you were fain
To watcli the earth grow green again;
When April's violets, here and there,
Surprised the imexpectant air,
You searched them out, and brought
me some.
To show, you said, tliat spring was
come.
But, sweetheart, when the lavish May
Rained flowers and fragrance round
your way.
You liad no thought her bloom to
bi'ing,
To prove the presence of the spring!
Believe me, when Love's April-time
Shall ripen to its perfect prime.
You will not need a sign to know
What every glance and breath will
sliow !
DRIVIXG HOME THE COWS.
Oi'T of the clover and blue-eyed grass
He turned them Into the river lane ;
One after another he let them pass,
Then fastened the meadow -bars
again.
Lender the willows, and over the hill,
He patiently followed their sober
pace ;
The merry whistle for once was still.
And something shadowed the sun-
ny face.
Only a hoy! and his father had said
He never could let his youngest go :
Two already were lying (lead,
Under the feet of the trampling
foe.
But after the evening work Avas done.
And the frogs were loud in the
meadow-swamp,
Over his shoulder he slung his gun.
And stealthily followed the foot-
path damp.
Across the clover, and through the
wheat.
With resolute heart and purpose
grim.
Though cold was the dew on his hur-
rying feet, I him.
And the blind bat's flitting startled
Thrice since then had the lanes been
white,
And tlie orchards sweet with apple-
bloom;
And now, when the cows came back
at night.
The feeble father drove them home.
For news had come to the lonely
farm
That three were lying where two
had lain;
404
aSHAUGHNESSY.
And the old man's tremulous, pal-
sied arm
Could never lean on a son's again.
The simimer day grew cool and late.
He went for the cows when the
work was done;
l>ut down the lane, as he opened the
gate,
lie saw them coming one by one, —
Brindle, Ebony, Speckle, and Bess,
Shaking their horns in the evening
wind ;
Cropping the buttercups out of the
grass, — hind ?
15ut who was it following close be-
Loosely swung in the idle air
The empty sleeve of army blue ;
And worn and pale, from the crisp-
ing hair,
Looked out a face that the father
knew.
For southern prisons will sometimes
yawn.
And yield their dead unto life
again ;
And the day that comes with a cloudy
dawn
In golden glory at last may wane.
The great tears sprang to their meet-
ing eyes ;
For the heart must speak when the
lips are dumb;
And under the silent evening skies
Together they followed the cattle
home.
ARTHUR O'SHAUGHNESSY.
SONG OF A FELLOW-WORKER.
I FOUNB a fellow-worker when I deemed I toiled alone :
My toil was fashioning thought and sound, and his was hewing stone;
I worked in the palace of my brain, he in the common street;
And it seemed his toil was great and hard, while mine was great and sweet.
I said, " O fellow-worker, yea, for I am a worker too.
The heart nigh fails me many a day, but how is it with you ?
For while I toil, great tears of joy will sometimes fill my eyes.
And when I form my perfect work, it lives and never dies.
"I carve the marble of pure thought until the thought takes form,
Until it gleams before my soul and makes the world grow warm;
Until there comes the glorious voice and words that seem divine,
And the music reaches all men's hearts and draws them into mine.
" And yet for days it seems my heart shall blossom never more.
And the burden of my loneliness lies on me very sore:
Therefore, O hewer of the stones that pave base human ways.
How canst thou bear the years till death, made of such thankless days ?"
Then he replied: " Ere sunrise, when the pale lips of the day
Sent forth an earnest thrill of breath at warmth of the first ray.
A great thousrht rose within me, how, while men asleep had lain.
The thousand labors of the world had grown up once again.
" The sun grew on the world, and on my soul the thought grew too, —
A great appalling sun, to light my soul the long day through.
I felt the world's whole burden for a moment, then began
With man's gigantic strength to do the labor of one man.
" I went forth hastily, and lo! I met a hundred men,
The worker with the chisel and tlie worker witli the pen, —
The restless toilers after good, wlio sow and never reap.
And one who maketh music for their souls that may not sleep.
*• Each passed me with a dauntless look, and my imdaunted eyes
Were almost softened as they passed with tears that strove to rise
At sight of all those labors, and because that every one.
Ay, the greatest, would be greater if my little were undone.
" They passed me, having faith in me, and in our several ways.
Together we began to-day as on tlie other days:
1 felt their mighty hands at work, and, as the days wore through,
Perhaps they felt that even I was helping somewhat too.
" Perhaps they felt, as with those hands they lifted mightily
The burden once more laid upon the world so heavily,
That while they nobly held it as each man can do and bear.
It did not wholly fall my side as though no men were there.
" And so we toil together many a day from morn till night,
I in the lower depths of life, they on the lovely height;
For though the common stones are mine, and Lhey have lofty cares,
Their work begins where this leaves off, and mine is part of theirs.
" And 't is not wholly mine or theirs, I think of through the day,
But the great, eternal thing we make together, I and they;
Far in the sunset I behold a city that man owns.
Made fair with all their nobler toil, built of my common stones.
" Then noonward, as the task grows light with all the labor done,
The single thought of all the day becomes a joyous one;
For, rising in my heart at last where it has lain so long,
It thrills up seeking for a voice, and grows almost a song.
" But when the evening comes, indeed, the words have taken wing,
The thought sings in me still, but I am all too tired to sing:
Therefore, O you my friend, who serve the world with minstrelsy.
Among our fellow-workers' songs make that one sons for me.
Rebecca S. Palfrey.
WHITE UNDERNEATH.
1a\T() a city street.
Narrow and noisome, chance had led
my feet;
Poisonous to every sense; and the
sun's rays
Loved not the unclean place.
It seemed that no pure thing
Its whiteness here would ever dare to
bring ;
Yet even into this dark place and
low,
God had sent down his snow.
Here, too, a little child,
IStood by the drift, now blackened
and defiled; Iplay,
And with his i-osy hands, in earnest
Scraped the dark crust away.
Checking my hurried pace,
To watch the busy hands and earnest
face, |hght,
I heard liiin laugh aloud in pure de-
That underneath, 'twas white.
Then, through a broken pane,
A woman's voice summoned him in
again.
With softened mother-tones, that half
excused
The unclean words she used.
And as I lingered near.
His baby accents fell upon my ear:
'• See, I can make the snow again for
you.
All clean and white and new! "
Ah ! surely God knows best.
Our sight is short: faith trusts to Him
the rest.
Sometimes, we know. He gives to hu-
man hands
To work out His commands.
Perhaps He holds apart.
By baby fingers in that mother's heart.
One fair, clean spot that yet may
spread and grow.
Till all be white as snow.
Theodore Parker.
THE WAY, THE TRUTH AND THE
LIFE.
O THOU, great Friend to all the sons
of men,
Who once appeared in humblest
guise below.
Sin to rebuke, to break the captive's
chain.
And call Thy brethren forth from
want and woe, —
We look to thee! Thy truth is still the
Light
Which guides the nations, groping
on their way.
Stumbling and falling in disastrous
night.
Yet hoping ever for the perfect
day.
Yes; Thou art still the Life, Thou art
the way
The holiest known; Light, Life,
the Way of heaven!
And they who dearest hope and
deepest pray
Toil by the Light, Life, Way,
which Thou liast given.
THE HIGHER GOOD.
Father, I will not ask for wealth or
fame.
Though once they would have
joyed my carnal sense ;
I shudder not to bear a hated name,
Wanting all wealth, myself my sole
defence.
But give me. Lord, eyes to behold
the truth ;
A seeing sense that knows the
eternal right;
A heart with pity filled, and gen-
tlest ruth;
A manly faith that makes all dark-
ness light. [kind:
Give me the power to labor for man-
Make me the mouth of such as
cannot speak :
Eyes let me be to groping men. and
blind; [weak
A conscience to tlie base; and to the
Let me be hands and feet; and to
the foolish, mind:
And lead still further on such as
Thy kingdom seek.
PARNELL.
4U7
Thomas Parnell.
in MX TO CONTENTMENT.
Lovely, lasting Peace of mind!
Sweet delight of human kind !
Heavenly-horn, and hred on high,
To crown the, favorites of the sky
Witli more of happiness helow,
Than victors in a triumph know!
Whither, O whitlier art thou fled,
To lay thy meek, contented head ?
What happy region dost thou please
To make the seat of calms and ease '?
Amhition searches all its sphere
Of pomp and state, to meet thee there.
Increasing avarice would find
Thy presence in its gold enshrined.
The hold adventurer ploughs his way
Through rocks amidst the foaming
sea
To gain thy love; and then perceives
Thou wert not in the rocks and waves.
The silent heart, which grief assails,
Treads soft and lonesome o'er the
vales.
Sees daisies open, rivers run.
And seeks (as I have vainly done)
>\ musing thought; but learns to know
That Solitude's the nurse of woe.
No real happiness is found
In trailing purple o'er the ground :
Or in a soul exalted high,
To range the circuit of the sky.
Converse with stars above, and know
All Nature in its forms below;
The rest it seeks, in seeking dies,
And doubts at last for knowledge
rise.
Lovely, lasting Peace, appear!
This world itself, if thou art here.
Is once again with Eden blest.
And man contains it in his breast.
'Twas thus, as under shade I stood,
I sung my wishes to the wood,
And, lost in thought, no more per-
ceived
The brandies wliisp(>r as they waved ;
It seemed as all the quiet place
Confessed the presence of her grace.
When thus she spoke — " Go rule thy
will.
Bid thy wild passions all be still.
Know God — and bring thy heart to
know
The joys which from religion flow:
Then every grace shall prove its guest.
And ril be there to crown the rest."
Oh! by yonder mossy seat,
In my hours of sweet retreat,
jNIight I thus my soul employ
With sense of gratitude and joy:
liaised as ancient prophets were,
In heavenly vision, praise, and
prayer ;
Pleasing all men, hurting none.
Pleased and blessed with God alone:
Then while the gardens take my
sight,
With all the colors of delight;
While silver waters glide along.
To please my ear, and court my song ;
I'll lift my voice, and tune my string,
And tliee, great Source of Nature,
sing.
The sun that walks his airy way.
To liglit the world, and give the day:
The moon that shines with borrowed
light;
The stars that gild the gloomy night;
The seas tliat roll imnundierecl waves;
The wood that spreads its sliady
leaves;
The field whose ears conceal the
grain.
The yellow treasure of the plain ;
All of these, and all I see,
Should be sung, and sung by me :
They speak their Maker as they can,
But want and ask the tongue of man.
Go search among your idle dreams.
Yom- Intsy or your vain extremes ;
And find a life of equal bliss.
Or own the next be^un in this.
408
PARSONS.
Thomas William Parsons.
HUDSON niJEJ!.
EiVERS that roll most musical in song
Are often lovely to the mind alone :
The wanderer muses, as he moves along
Their barren banks, on glories not their own.
When, to give substance to his boyish dreams,
He leaves his own, far countries to survey.
Oft must he think, in greeting foreign streams,
''Their names alone are beautiful, not they."
If chance he mark the dwindled Arno pour
A tide more meagre than his native Charles;
Or views the Hlione when summer's heat is o'er,
Subdued and stagnant in the fen of iVrles:
Or when he sees the slimy Tiber fling
His sullen tribute at the feet of liome,
Oft to his thought must partial memory bring
Movo nol)le waves, witliout renown, at home.
Now let him climb the C'atskill, to behold
The lordly Hudson, marching to the main.
And say what bard, in any land of old.
Had such a river to inspire his strain.
Along the Rhine gray battlements and towers
Declare what robbers once the realm possessed;
But here Heaven's handiwork surpasseth ours.
And man has hardly more than built his nest.
No storied castle overawes these heights;
Nor antique arches clieck the current's play;
Nor mouldering architrave the mind invites
To dream of deities long passed away.
No Gothic buttress, or decaying shaft
Of maible, yellowed by a thousand years.
Lifts a great landmark to the little craft, —
A summer cloud: that comes and disappears.
But cliffs, unaltered from their primal form
Since the subsiding of the deluge, rise
And hold their savins to the up]ier storm.
While far l)elow, the skiff securely plies.
Farms, rich not more in meadows than in men
Of Saxon mould, and strong for every toil,
Spread o'er the plain, or scatter through the glen,
Bu'Otian plenty on a Spartan soil.
PABSONS.
409
Then, where tlie reign of cultivation ends.
Again the charming wilderness begins :
From steep to steep one solemn wootl extends,
Till some new hamlet's rise, the boscage thins.
And these deep gi'oves forever have remained
Touched by no axe, — by no proud owner nursed;
As now they stand they stood when Tharaoh reigned,
Lineal descendants of creation's first.
No tales, we know, are chronicled of thee
In ancient scrolls ; no deeds of doubtful claim
Have hung a history on every tree,
And given each I'ock its fable and a fame.
But neither here hath any conqueror trod,
Nor grim invaders from barbarian climes;
No horrors feigned of giant or of god
Pollute thy stillness with recorded crimes.
Here never yet have happy fields laid waste,
The ravished harvest and the blasted fruit,
The cottage ruined and the shrine defaced,
Tracked the foul passage of the feudal brute.
"Yet, O Antifjuity I ■' the stranger sighs;
" Scenes wanting thee soon pall upon the view;
The soul's indifference dulls the sated eyes.
Where all is fair indeed, — but all is new.'"
False thought! is age to crumbling walls confined ?
To Grecian fiagments and Egyptian bones '.'
Hath Time no monuments to raise the mind,
More than old fortresses and sculjitured stones '?
Call not this new which is the only land
Tliat wears unchanged the same primeval face
Which, when just dawning from its Makei-'s hand,
Gladdened the first great grandsire of our race.
Nor did Euphrates with an earlier birth
Glide past green Eden towards the unknown south,
Than Hudson broke upon the infant earth.
And kissed the ocean with his nameless mouth.
Twin-born with .Jordan, Ganges, and the Nile!
Thebes and the pyramids to thee are young;
Oil ! had thy waters burst from Britain's isle.
Till now i)erchance they had not flowed unsung.
410
PATMORE.
THE GROOMSMAN TO HIS
MISTliESS.
EvKRY wedding, says the proverb,
Makes another, soon or late;
Never yet was any marriage
Entered in the book of Fate,
But the names were also written
Of the patient jjair that wait.
Blessings then upon the morning
When my friend with fondest look.
By the solemn rites' permission,
To himself his mistress took,
And the Destinies recorded
Other two within their book.
While the priest fulfilled his office.
Still the ground the lovers eyed.
And the parents and the kinsmen
Aimed their glances at the bride;
But the groomsmen eyed the virgins
Who were waiting at her side.
Three there were that stood beside
her ;
One was dai-k, and one was fair;
But nor fair nor dark the other.
Save her Arab eyes and hair;
Neither dark nor fair. I call her,
Yet she was the fairest there.
While her groomsman — shall I own it?
Yes, to thee, and only thee —
Gazed upon this dark-eyed maiden
Who was fairest of the three.
Thus he thought: "How blest the
bridal
Where the bride were such as she I ' "
Then I mused upon the adage.
Till my wisdom was perplexed,
And 1 wondered, as the churchman
Dwelt upon his holy text,
Which of all who heard his lesson
Should refjuire the service next.
Whose will be the next occasion
For the flo\rcrs, the feast, the wine '?
Thine, ])erchance, my dearest lady ;
Or, who knows ? — it may be mine:
What if 't were — forgive the fancy —
What if 'twere both mine and
thine ?
Coventry Patmore.
[From The Betrothal.]
SWEET MEETING OF DESIRES.
I GiiEW assured before I asked.
That she'd be mine without reserve,
And in her imclaimed graces basked
At leisure, till the time sliould
serve, —
With just (Miough of dread to thrill
The hope, and make it trebly dear;
Thus loath to si)eak the word, to kill
Either the hope or happy fear.
Till once, through lanes returning
late,
Her laughing sisters lagged behind ;
And ere we reached her father's gate.
We paused with one iiresentient
mind ;
And, in the dim and perfumed mist,
Their coming stayed; who blithe
and free,
And very women, loved to assist
A lover's opportunity.
Twice rose, twice died, my trembling
word ;
To faint and frail cathedral chimes
Spake time in music, and we heard
The chafers rustling in the limes.
Her dress, that touched me where I
stood ;
The warmth of her confided arm;
Her bosom's gentle neighborhood;
Her pleasure in her power to charm ;
Her look, her love, her form, her
touch !
The least seemed most by blissful
tmn, —
Blissful but that it i.leased too
much,
And taught the wayward soul to
yearn.
It was as if a harp with wires
Was traversed by tlie breath I drew ;
And oh, sweet meeting of desires !
She, answering, owned tliat slie
loved too.
WOULD WISDOM FOR HERSELF
BE 'wooed.
Woui.D Wisdom for herself be wooed.
And wake the foolish from his
dream,
{She must be glad as well as good,
And must not only be, but seem.
Beauty and joy are hers by right;
And, knowing this, I wonder less
That she's so scorned, when falsely
dight
In misery and ugliness.
What's that which Heaven to man
endears.
And that which eyes no sooner see
Than the heart says, with floods of
tears,
"Ah! that's the thing which I
would be ? "
Not childhood, full of fears and frets :
Not youth, impatient to disown
Those visions high, which to forget
Were worse than never to have
known.
Not these; but souls foimd liere ami
here.
Oases in our waste of sin.
When everything is well and fair,
And God remits his discipline;
AVhose sweet subdual of the world
'I'he worldling scarce can recognize;
And ridicule, against it hurled.
Drops witli a broken sting and dies.
They live by law, not like the fool.
But like the bard who freely sings
In strictest bonds of rhyme and rule,
And linds in them not bonds but
James Gates Percival.
[From J'r()iiie.t/H'ai<, Part II.]
AI'OSTROPHE TO THE SUN.
(ENTiiE of light and energy ! thy way
Is through the unknown void; thou
hast thy throne,
Morning, and evening, and at noon
of day.
Far in the blue, untended and alone;
Ere the tirst-wakened airs of earth
had blown.
On thou didst march, triumphant in
thy light;
Then thou diilst send thy glance,
which still hath flown
Wide througli the never-ending
woi-lds of night.
And yet thy full orb bui-ns with flash
as keen and bright.
Thy path is high in Heaven; — we
cannot gaze
On the intense of light that girds thy
car ;
There is a crown of glory in thy rays.
Which bear thy pure divinity afar.
To mingle with the equal light of
star ;
For thou, so vast to us, art in the
whole
One of the sparks of night, that fire
the air,
i\.nd as around thy centre planets
roll.
So thou too hast thy path aroimd the
Central Soul.
Age o'er thee has no power; — thou
bring' st the same
Light to renew the morning, as when
first, [flame.
If not eternal, thou, with front of
On the dark face of earth in glory
burst.
And warmed the seas, and in their
bosom nursed
The earliest things of life, the worm
and shell ;
412
PERCIVAL.
Till through the sinking ocean, moun-
tains pierced,
And then came fortli tlie land where-
on we dwell.
Reared like a magic fane above the
watery swell.
Thou lookest on the earth, and then
it smiles;
Thy light is hid, and all things droop
and mourn ;
Laughs the wide sea around her bud-
ding isles,
When through their heaven thy
changing car is borne ;
Thou wheel' St away thy flight, the
woods are shorn
Of all their waving locks, and storms
anake;
All, that was once so beautiful, is
torn
By the wild winds which plough the
lonely lake.
And in their maddening rush, the
crested mountains shake.
The earth lies buried in a shroud of
snow;
Life lingers, and would die, but thy
leturn
Gives to their gladdened hearts an
overflow
Of all the power that brooded in the
urn
Of their chilled frames, and then
they proudly spurn
All bands that would confine, and
give to air
Hues, fragrance, shapes of beauty,
till they burn.
When on a dewy morn thou dartest
there
Rich waves of gold to wreathe with
fairer light the fair.
Thine are the mountains, where they
purely lift
Snows that have never wasted, in a
sky
Which iiath no stain; below, the
storm may drift
Its darkness, and the thunder-gust
roar by ;
Aloft in thy eternal smile they lieautiful faces
And eyes of tropical dusk, —
And one face shining out like a star,
One face haunting the dreams of
each,
And one voice sweeter than others
are.
Breaking into silvery speech, —
Telling, through lips of bearded
bloom.
An old, old story over again.
As down the royai bannered room.
To the golden gittern's strain.
Two and two, they dreamily walk.
While an unseen spirit walks be-
side.
And, all unheard in the lovers' talk,
He claimeth one for a bride.
O Maud and Madge, dream on to-
gether.
With never a pang of jealous fear!
For, ere the bitter St. Agnes weather
Shall whiten another year,
Eobed for the bridal, and robed foi-
the tomb.
Braided brown hair and golden
tress.
There '11 be only one of you left for
the bloom
Of the bearded lips to press, —
Only one for the bridal pearls.
The robe of satin and I3russels lace.
Only one to blush through her curls
At the sight of a lover's face.
O beautiful Madge, in your bridal
white.
For you the revel has just begun :
PERRY.
415
But for her Avho sleeps in your arms
to-night
The revel of life is done !
But, robed and crowned with your
saintly bliss,
Queen of heaven and bride of the
sun,
O beautiful Maud, you' 11 never miss
The kisses another hath won!
IN
ANTICIPATION.
" I'll take the orchard path,'' she
said.
Speaking lowly, smiling slowly :
The brook was dried within its bed.
The hot sun flung a flame of red
Low in the west as forth she sped.
Across the dried brook-course she
went,
Singing lowly, smiling slowly;
She scarcely felt the sun that spent
Its fiery force in swift descent.
She never saw the wheat was bent.
The grasses parched, the blossoms
dried ;
Singing lowly, smiling slowly.
Her eyes amidst the drouth espied
A summer pleasance far and wide.
With roses and sweet violets pied.
II.
DISAPPOINTMENT.
But homeward coming all the way.
Sighing lowly, pacing slowly.
She knew the bent wheat withering
lay.
She saw the blossoms' dry decay.
She missed the little brooklet's play.
A breeze had sprung from out the
south,
But, sighing lowly, pacing slowly.
She only felt the burning drouth;
Her eyes were hot and parched her
mouth.
Yet sweet the wind blew from the
south.
And when the wind brought welcome
rain.
Still sighing lowly, pacing slowly.
She never saw the lifting grain.
But only — a lone orchard lane.
Where she had waited all in vain.
TYTNG HER BONNET UNDER HER
CHIN.
Tying her bonnet under her chin,
She tied her raven ringlets in ;
But not alone in the silken snare
Did she catch her lovely floating hair,
For, tyingher bonnet under her chin.
She tied a young man's heart within.
They were strolling together up the
hill.
Where the wind comes blowing meriy
and chill ;
And it blew the ciu-ls a frolicsome
race.
All over her happy peach-colored
face.
Till, scolding and laughing, she tied
them in.
Under her beautiful dimpled chin.
And it blew a color, bright as the
bloom
Of the pinkest fuchsia's tossing
plume.
All over the cheeks of the prettiest
girl
That ever imprisoned a romping ciu'l,
Or, tying her bonnet under her chin.
Tied a young man's heart within.
Steeper and steeper grew the hill :
Madder, merrier, chillier still
The western wind blew down, and
played
The wildest tricks with the little
maid.
As, tying her bonnet under her chin.
She tied a young man's heart within.
O western wind, do you think it was
fair.
To play such tricks with her floating
hair?
To gladly, gleefully do your best
To blow her against the young man's
breast,
Where he as gladly folded her in.
And kissed her mouth and her dim-
pled chin ?
Ah! Ellery Vane, you little thought.
An hour ago, when you besought
This country lass to walk with you,
After the sun had dried the dew,
What perilous danger you'd be in.
As she tied her bonnet under her
chin !
SOME DAY OF DA I'.S'.
(Some day; some day of days, thread-
ing the street
With idle, heedless pace,
Unlooking for such grace,
I shall behold your face!
Some day, some day of days, thus
may we meet.
Perchance the sun may shine from
skies of May,
Or winter's icy chill
Touch whitely vale and hill.
What matter '> I shall thrill
Through every vein with summer on
that day.
Once more life's perfect youth will
all come back,
And for a moment there
I shall stand fresh and fair.
And drop the garment care ;
Once more my Y>erfect youth will
nothing lack.
I shut my eyes now, thinking how
'twin be,—
How face to face each soul
Will slip its long control.
Forget the dismal dole
Of dreary Fate's dark separating sea;
And glance to glance, and hand to
hand in greeting,
The past with all its fears.
Its silences and tears.
Its lonely, yearning years.
Shall vanish in the moment of that
meeting.
Elizabeth Stuart Phelps.
ALL THE RIVERS.
" All the rivers run into the sea."
Like the pulsing of a river.
The motion of a song.
Wind the olden words along
The tortuous turnings of my thoughts
whenever
I sit beside the sea.
" All the rivers run into the sea."
O you little leaping river
Laugh on beneath your breath !
With a heart as deep as death.
Strong stream, go patient, grave, and
hasting never, —
I sit beside the sea.
" All the rivers run into the sea."
Why the passion of a river ?
The striving of a soul ?
Calm the eternal waters roll
Upon the eternal shore. At last,
whatever
Seeks it — finds the sea.
"All the rivers run into the sea.''
O thou boiuiding, burning river,
Hurrying heart! I seem
To kiio\\" ( so one knows in a dream )
That in the waiting heart of C4od
forever.
Thou too shall find the sea.
GEORGE ELIOT.
A i>iLY rooted in a sacred soil.
Arrayed with those who neither spin
nor toil;
Dinah, the preacher, through the
purple air,
PHELPS.
417
Forever, in her gentle evening prayer,
Shall plead for lier — what ear too
(leaf to hear ? —
"As if she spoke to some one very
near. ' '
\i\A he of storied Florence, whose
great heart
Broke for its human error; wrapped
apart, | flame
And scorching in the swift, prophetic
Of passion for late holiness and
shame
Than untried glory grander, gladder,
higher —
Deathless, for her, he "testifies by
fire."
A statue, fair and firm, on marble
feet.
Womanhood's woman, Dorothea,
sweet
As strength, and strong as tender-
ness, to make
A "struggle with tlie dark" for
white light's sake,
Immortal stands, unanswered speaks.
>Sliall they,
Of her great hand the moulded,
breathing clay,
Her fit, select, and proud survivors
be ? —
Possess tlie life eternal, and not .s7k; ?
DESERTED NESTS.
I'd rather see an empty bough, —
A dreary, weary bough that himg
As boughs will hang within whose
arms
No mated birds had ever sung;
Far rather than to see or touch
The sadness of an empty nest
Where joy has been, but is not \\o\\\
Where love has been, but is not blest.
There is no sadness in the world.
No other like it liere or there, —
The sadness of deserted homes
In nests, or hearts, or anywhere.
A LETTER.
Two things love can do,
Only two :
Can distrust, or can believe;
It can die, or it can live,
There is no syncope
Possible to love or me,
Go your ways !
Two things you can do,
Only two :
Be the thing you used to be.
Or be notliing more to me.
I can but joy or grieve,
Can no more than die or live.
Go your ways !
So far I wrote, my darling, drearily,
But now my sad pen falls down wear-
iiy
From out my trembling hand.
I did not, do not, cannot mean it,
dear !
Come life or death, joy, grief, or
hope, or fear,
I bless you where I stand !
I bless you where I stand, excusing
you.
No speech nor language for accusing
you
My laggard lips can learn.
To you — be what you are, or can, to
me, —
To you or blessedly or fatefully
My heart must turn !
418
PIATT.
John James Piatt.
liEADIXG THE MILESTOXE.
I STOPPED to read the milestone here,
A laggard school-boy, long ago;
I came not far — my home was near —
But ah, how far I longed to go!
Behold a number and a name,
x\. linger, westward, cut in stone:
The vision of a city came.
Across the dust and distance shown.
Around me lay the farms asleep
In hazes of autunmal air,
And sounds that quiet loves to keep
Were heard, and heard not, every-
where.
I read the milestone, day by day :
I yearned to cross the barren bound,
To know the golden Far-away,
To walk the new Enchanted
Ground !
TWO PATRONS.
"What shall I sing?" I sighed,
and said,
" That men shall Icnow me when
my name
Is lost with kindred lips, and dead
Are laurels of familiar fame ? "
Below, a violet in the dew
Breathed through the dark its
vague perfume;
Above, a star in quiet blue
Touched with a gracious ray the
gloom.
"Sing, friend, of me," the violet
sighed,
" That I may haunt your grave
witlilove;"
"Sing, friend, of me," the star re-
plied,
" That I may light the dark above."
THE SIGHT OF ANGELS.
The angels come, the angels go.
Through oijeii doors of purer air;
Their moving presence oftentimes
we know,
It tlirills us everywhere.
Sometimes we see them ; lo ! at night.
Our eyes were shut, but opened
seem :
The darkness breathed a breath of
wondrous light,
And then it was a dream!
THE LOVE-LETTEU.
I GREET thee, loving letter —
Unopened, kiss thee free.
And dream her lips within thee
Give back the kiss to me !
The fragrant little rose-leaf.
She sends by thee, is come :
Ah, in her heart was blooming
The rose she stole it from!
THE GOLDEN HAND.
Lo, from the city's heat and dust
A golden hand forever thrust.
Uplifting from a spire on high
A shining finger in the sky !
I see it when the morning brings
Fresh tides of life to living things.
And the great world awakes: behold.
That lifted hand in morning gold !
I see it when the noontide beats
Pulses of fire in busy streets ;
The dust flies in the flaming air:
Above, that quiet hand is there.
I see it when the twilight clings
To the dark earth with hovering
wings :
Flashing with the last fluttering ray,
That golden hand remembers day.
The midnight comes — the holy hour :
The city like a giant flower
Sleeps full of dew : that hand, in light
Of moon and stars, how weirdly
bright!
PIATT.
419
Below, in many a noisy street
Are toiling hands and striving feet;
The weakest rise, the strongest fall :
That equal hand is over all.
Below, in courts to guard the land,
Gold buys the tongue and binds the
hand ;
Stealing in God's great scales the
gold ;
That awful hand, above, behold I
Below, the Sabbaths walk serene
With the great dust of days between;
Preachers within their pulpits stand :
See, over all, that heavenly hand I
But the hot dust, in crowded air
Below, arises never there:
O speech of one who cannot speak I
O Sabbath-witness of the Week !
A SOXG OF CONTENT.
The eagle nestles near the sun ;
The dove's low nest for me! —
The eagle's on the crag: sweet one.
The dove's in our green tree.
For hearts that beat like thine and
mine.
Heaven blesses humble earth ;
The angels of our Heaven shall shine
The angels of our hearth !
Sarah M. B. Piatt.
TO-DA Y.
Ah, real thing of bloom and breath,
I cannot love you while you stay;
Put on the dim, still charm of death.
Fade to a phantom, float away,
And let me call you Yesterday !
Let empty flower-dust at my feet
Eemind me of the buds you wear;
Let the bird's quiet show liow sweet
The far-off singing made the air;
And let your dew through frost
look fair.
In mourning you I shall rejoice.
Go : for the bitter word may be
A music — in the vanished voice ;
And on the dead face I may see
How bright its frown has been to
me.
Then in the haunted grass I'll sit.
Half-tearful in your withered place.
And watch your lovely shadow flit
Across To-morrow's simny face.
And vex her with your perfect
grace.
So, real thing of bloom and breath.
I weary of you while you stay.
Put on tiie dim, still charm of death.
Fade to a phantom, float away.
And let me call you Yesterday !
LAST WORDS.
Good-night, . pretty sleepers of
mine —
I never shall see you again :
Ah, never in shadow or shine ;
Ah, never in dew nor in rain !
In your small dreaming-dresses of
white.
With the wild-bloom you gathered
to-day
In your quiet shut hands, from the
light
And the dark, you will wander
away.
Though no graves in the bee-haunted
grass.
And no love in the beautiful sky.
Shall take you as yet, you will
pass.
With this kiss through these teai-
di-ops. Good-by !
With less gold and more gloom in
their hair.
When the buds near have faded to
flowers.
Three faces may wake here as fair —
But older than yours are, by
hoiu's !
420
PI A IT.
Good-night, then, lost darlings of
mine —
I never shall see yon again :
Ah, never in shadow nor shine;
Ah, never in dew nor in rain !
A DREAM'S A WAKENIXG.
Shut in a close and dreary sleep,
Lonely and frightened and op-
pressed
I felt a dreadful serpent creep,
Writhing and crushing o'er my
breast.
I woke and knew" my chikUs sweet
arm,
As soft and pure as flakes of snow.
Beneath my dream's dark, hateful
charm,
Had been the thing that tortured so.
And in the morning's dew and light
I seemed to hear an angel say,
" The Pain that stings in Time's low
night
3Iav prove God's Love in higher
\lay."
THAT NEW WORLD.
How gracious we are to grant to the
dead
Those wide, vague lands in the
foreign sky.
Reserving this world for ourselves
instead —
For we must live, though others
must die!
And what is this world that we keep,
I pray ?
True, it has glimpses of dews and
flowers ;
Then Youth and Love are here and
away, [ours.
Like mated birds — but nothing is
Ah, nothing indeed, but we cling to
it all."^
It is nothing to hear one's own
heart beat,
It is nothing to see one's own tears
fall;
Yet surely the breath of our life is
sweet.
Yes, the breath of our life is so
sweet, 1 fear
We were loath to give it for all we
know
Of that charmed country we hold so
dear,
Far into whose beauty the breath-
less go.
Yet certain we are, when we see
them fade
Out of the pleasant light of the
sun.
Of the sands of gold in the palm-
leaf's shade.
And the sti'ange high jewels all
these have won.
You dare not doubt it, O soul of
mine!
And yet if these empty eyes could
see
One, only one, from that voyage di-
vine.
With something, anything sure for
me!
Ah, blow me the scent of one lily, to
tell
That it grew outside of this world
at most ;
Ah, show me a plume to touch, or a
shell
That whispers of some miearthly
coast !
MAKING PEACE.
After this feud of yours and mine
The sun will shine;
After we both forget, forget,
The sun will set.
I pray you think how warm and
sweet
The heart can beat;
I pray you think how soon the rose
From grave-dust grows.
PIATT.
421
CALLING THE DEAD.
Mv little child, so sweet a voice
might wake
So sweet a sleeper for so sweet a
sake. [you,
Calling your buried brother back to
You laugh and listen — till I listen
too!
Why does he listen ? It may be to
hear
Sounds too divine to reach my
troubled eai-.
\Vhy does he laugh '? It may be lie
can see
The face that only tears can hide
from me.
Poor baby faith — so foolish or so
wise :
The name I shape out of forlornest
cries
He speaks as with a bird's or blos-
som's breath.
How fair the knowledge is that
knows not Death !
Ah, fools and blind — through all the
piteous years
Searchers of stars and graves — how
many seers,
Calling the dead, and seeking for a
sign,
Have laughed and listened, like this
child of mine ?
THE FLOWERS IN THE GROUND.
Under the cofhn-lid there are roses:
They bud like dreams in the sleep
of the dead ;
And the long, vague dark that around
them closes
Is flushed and sweet with their
glory of red.
From the buried seeds of love they
blossom,
All crimson-stained from its blood
they start;
And each sleeper wears them on his
bosom,
Clasped over the pallid dust of his
heart.
When the Angel of Morning shall
shake the slumber
Away from the graves with his
lighted wings,
He will gather those roses, an infi-
nite number,
And bear them to Heaven, the
beautiful things!
ASKING FOR TEARS.
On, let me come to Thee in this wild
way,
Fierce with a grief that will not
sleep, to pray
Of all thy treasures, Father, only
one,
After which I may say — Thy will be
done.
Nay, fear not thou to make my time
too sweet;
I nurse a Sorrow, — kiss its hands
and feet,
Call it all piteous, precious names.
and try,
Awake at night, to hush its helpless
cry.
The sand is at my moaning lip, the
glare
Of the uplifted desert fills the air;
My eyes are blind and burning, and
the years
Stretch on before me. Therefore,
give me tears !
422
PIEBPOXT.
John Pierpont.
THE PILGRIM FA THE US.
The Pilgrim Fathers — where are
tliey ?
Tlie A\'aves that brought them o'er
Still roll in the bay, and throw their
spray,
xVs they break along the shore ;
Still roll in the bay, as they rolled that
day,
When the Mayflower moored below,
When the sea around was black with
storms.
And white the shore Avith snow.
The mists, that wrapped the Pilgrim's
sleep.
Still brood upon the tide ;
And the rocks yet keep their watch by
the deep,
To stay its waves of pride.
But the snow-white sail, that he gave
to the gale,
When the heavens looked dark, is
gone ; —
As an angel's wing, through an open-
ing cloud.
Is seen and then witlidrawn.
The Pilgrim exile — sainted name ! —
The hill, Avhose icy brow
Rejoiced, when he came, in the morn-
ing's tiame,
In the morning's flame burns now.
And the moon's cold light, as it lay
that night
On the hill-side and the sea.
Still lies where he laid his houseless
head ; —
But the Pilgrim — where is he ?
The Pilgrim Fathers are at rest:
AVhen summer is throned on high,
And the world's warm breast is in
verdure dressed.
Go, stand on the hill where they lie.
The earliest ray of the golden day.
On that hallowed spot is cast ;
And the evening sun, as he leaves the
world.
Looks kindly on that spot last.
The Pilgrim spirit has not fled:
It walks in noon's broad light;
And it watches the bed of the glo-
rious dead,
AVith the holy stars by night.
It watches the bed of the brave who
have bled.
And shall guard this ice-bound
shore.
Till the waves of the bay, where the
Mayflower lay.
Shall foam and freeze no more.
MY CHILI).
I CANNOT make him dead !
His fair sunshiny head
Is ever bomidiug round my study
chair;
Yet, when my eyes, now dim
Witli tears, I turn to him,
The vision vanishes — he is not
there.
I walk my parlor floor,
And, through the open door,
I hear a footfairon the chamber stair,
I' m stepping toward the hall.
To give the boy a call ;
And then bethink me that — he is
not there:
I thread the crowded street,
A satchelled lad I meet,
With the same beaming eyes and col-
ored hair:
And, as he 's running by.
Follow him Mith my eye.
Scarcely believing that — he is not
there !
I know his face is hid
Under the coffin lid :
Closed are his eyes : cold is his fore-
head fair ;
My hand that marble felt:
O'er it in prayer I knelt
Yet my heart whispers that — he is
not there.
I cannot make him dead !
When passing by the bed,
So long watched over with parental
care,
My spirit and my eye
Seek him inquiringly,
]3efore the thought comes that — he
is not there !
When, at the cool, gray break
Of day, from sleep 1 wake.
With my first breathing of the morn-
ing air,
My soul goes up, with joy.
To II im who gave my i3oy;
Then comes the sad thought that —
he is not there !
When at the day's calm close.
Before we seek repose, [prayer,
I'm with his mothei', offering up our
Whate'er I may be saying.
I am in spirit praying
For our boy's spirit, though — he is
not there !
Not there ! — Where then is he ?
The form I used to see
Was but the raiment that he used to
wear.
The grave, that now doth press
Upon that cast-off dress,
Is but his wardrobe locked ; — he is
not there !
He lives ! — In all the past
He lives ; nor, to the last.
Of seeing him again will I despair;
In dreams 1 see him now ;
And, on his angel ))row,
I see it written, " Thou shalt see me
there! "
Yes, we all live to God !
Fathek, thy chastening rod
.So help us, thine afflicted ones, to
bear,
That, in the spirit-land.
Meeting at thy right hand,
' T will be our heaven to find that —
lie is there !
Edgar Allan Poe.
ANXABEL LEE.
It was many and many a year ago.
In a kingdom by the sea.
That a maiden there lived whom you
may know
By the name of Annabel Lee;
And this maiden she lived with no
other thought
Than to love and be loved by me.
/ was a child and (^he was a child,
In this kingdom by the sea:
But we loved with a love that Avas
more than love —
I and my Annabel Lee;
With a love that the winged seraphs
of lieaven
Coveted her and me.
And this was the reason that, long
ago,
In the kingdom by the sea.
A wind blew out of the cloud, chilling
My beautiful Annabel Lee;
So that her highborn kinsmen came
And bore her away from me.
To shut her up in a sepulchre
In this kingdom by the sea.
The angels, not half so happy in
heaven.
Went envying her and me —
Yes! — that was the reason (as all
men know.
In this kingdom by the sea)
That the wind came out of the cloud
by night,
Chilling and killing my Annabel
Lee.
But our love it was stronger by far
than the love
Of those that were older than we —
Of many far wiser than we —
And neither the angels in heaven
above,
424
POE.
Nor the demons down under the
sea.
Can ever dissever my soul from the
soul
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee :
For the moon never beams, -without
bringing me dreams
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee ;
And the stars never rise, but I feel
the bright eyes
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee ;
And so, all the night-tide, I lie down
by the side
Of my darling — my darling — my
life and my bride.
In her sepulchre there by the sea.
In her tomb by the sounding sea.
THE BELLS.
Hear the sledges with the bells —
Silver bells !
What a world of merriment their mel-
ody foretells !
How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle.
In the icy air of night!
While the stars that oversprinkle
All the heavens, seem to twinkle
With a crystalline delight;
Keeping time, time, time.
In a sort of Kunic I'hyme,
To the tintinnabulation that so musi-
cally wells
From tlie bells, bells, bells, bells.
Bells, bells, bells —
From the jingling and the tinkling
of the bells.
Hear the mellow Avedding bells.
Golden bells !
What a world of happiness their har-
mony foretells !
Through the balmy air of night
How they ring out their delight I
From the molten-golden notes,
And all in tune.
What a liquid ditty floats
To the tmtle-dove that listens,
while she gloats
On the moon !
Oh, from out the sounding cells.
What a gush of euphony volumi-
noiislv wells!
• How it swells I
How it dwells
On the future! how it tells
Of the rapture that impels
To the swinging and the ringing
Of the bells, bells, bells,
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells.
Bells, bells, bells —
To the rhyming and the chiming of
the bells!
Hear the loud alarum bells —
Brazen bells !
What a tale of terror, now, their tur-
bulency tells!
In the startled ear of night
How they scream out their affright !
Too much horrified to speak,
They can only shriek, shriek,
Out of tune,
In a clamorous appealing to the mer-
cy of the tire.
In a mad expostulation with the deaf
and frantic fire
Leaping higher, higher, higher.
With a desperate desire.
And a resolute endeavor
Now — now to sit or never,
By the side of the pale-faced moon.
Oh, the bells, bells, bells!
What a tale their terror tells
Of despair!
How they clang, and clash, and
roar !
■\Vliat a horror they outpour
On the bosom of the palpitating
air!
Yet the ear it fully knows.
By the twanging,
And the clanging.
How the danger ebbs and flows;
Yet the ear distinctly tells.
In the jangling,
And the wrangling.
How the danger sinks and swells.
By the sinking or the swelling in the
anger of the bells —
Of the bells —
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells.
Bells, bells, bells —
In the clamor and the clangor of
the bells !
Hear the tolling of the bells —
Iron bells!
POE.
425
What a world of solemn thought their
monody compels!
In the silence of the night,
How we shiver with affright
At the melancholy menace of their
tone !
For every sound tliat floats
From the rust within their throats
Is a groan.
And the people — ah, the people —
They that dwell up in the steeple.
All alone.
And who tolling, tolling, tolling,
In that muffleil monotone.
Feel a glory in their rolling
On the human heart a stone —
They are neither man nor woman —
They are neither brute nor human ;
They are ghouls :
And their king it is who tolls ;
And he rolls, rolls, rolls,
Rolls
A pa^an from the bells !
And his merry bosom swells
AVith the pjean of the bells !
And he dances, and he yells:
Keeping time, time, time.
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the pasan of the bells —
Of the bells:
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme.
To the throbbing of the bells —
Of the bells, bells," bells —
To the sobbing of the bells ;
Keeping time, time, time.
As he knells, knells, khells.
In a happy Runic rhyme,
To the rolling of the bells —
Of tlie bells, bells, bells,
To the tolling of the bells.
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells —
Bells, bells, bells —
To the moaning and the groaning of
the bells.
TO MY MOTHER.
Because I feel that, in the heavens
above.
The angels, whispering to one
another.
Can find, among their bm-ning terms
of love.
None so devotional as that of
" Mother,"
Therefore by that dear name I long
have called you —
You who are more than mother
unto me.
And fill my heart of hearts, where
death installed you
In setting my Virginia's spirit free.
My mother — my own mother, who
died early, [you
AVas but the mother of myself; but
Are mother to tlie one I loved so
dearly.
And thus are dearer than the
mother I knew
By that infinity with which my wife
Was dearer to my soul than its soul-
life.
THE RAVEN.
Once tipon a midnight dreaiy, while I pondered, weak and weary
Over many a quaintand curious volume of forgotten lore —
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping.
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
"Tis some visitor," t muttered, "tapping at my chamber door —
Only this and nothing more."
Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December,
And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost \ipon the floor.
Eagerly I wished the morrow; — vainly I had sought to borrow
From my books surcease of sorrow — sorrow foi- the lost Lenore —
For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore —
Nameless here for ever more.
426
POE.
And the silken, sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain
Thrilled me — filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before ;
JSo that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating
" 'Tis some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door —
Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door;
This it is and nothing more."
Presently my soul grew stronger; hesitating then no longer,
"Sir," said I, " or Madam, tridy your forgiveness I implore;
But the fact is I was napping, and so gently you came rapping,
And so faintly you came tapping, tapping at my chamber door.
That I scarce was sure 1 heard you " — here I opened wide the door; —
Darkness there and nothing more.
Deep into the darkness peering, long I stood there, wondering, fearing,
Doubting, dreaming dreams no inortal ever tlared to dream before ;
But the silence was unbroken, and the stillness gave no token.
And the only word there spoken was the whispered word " Lenore ?'
This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word " Lenore! " —
Merely this and nothing more.
Back into the chaml>er turning, all my soul within me burning,
Soon again I heard a tapping somewhat louder than before.
" Surely," said I, " surely tliat is something at my window lattice;
Let me see then, what thereat is, and this mystery explore —
J.et my heart be still a moment and this mystery explore ; —
'Tis the wind and nothing more."
Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and flutter,
In there stepped a stately Raven of the saintly days of yore.
Not the least obeisance made he; not a minute stopped or stayed he;
But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above my chamber door —
Perched upon a bust of Pallas just above my chamber door —
Perched, and sat, and nothing more.
Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling.
By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore,
" Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou," I said, " art siu-e no craven,
Ghastly, grim and ancient Kaven, wandering from the Nightly shore —
Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night's Plutonian "shore! "
Quoth the Raven, " Nevermore."
Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to hear discourse so plainly,
Though its answer little meaning — little relevancy bore ;
For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being
Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird above his chamber door —
Bird or beast upon the sculptured bust above his chamber door.
With such name as " Nevermore."
But the Raven, sitting lonely on that placid bust, spoke only
That one word, as if his soul in that one word he did outpour.
Nothing farther then he uttered ; not a feather then he fluttered —
Till I scarcely more than muttered " Other friends have flown before —
On the morrow he will leave me, as my hopes have flown before."
Then the bird said "Nevermore."
startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken,
" Doubtless," said I, " what it utters is its only stock and store
Caught from some unhappy master whom unmerciful Disaster
Followed fast and followed faster till his songs one burden bore —
Till the dirges of his hope that melancholy burden bore
Of ' Never — nevermore.' "
But the Raven still beguiling all my sad soul into smiling,
Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of bird and bust and door;
Then, upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to linking
Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous bird of yore —
What this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt, and ominous bird of yore
Meant in croaking "Nevermore."
This I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable expressing
To the fowl whose fiery eyes now burned into my bosom's core;
This and more I sat divining, with my head at ease reclining
On the cushion's velvet lining that the lamp-light gloated o'er,
But whose velvet violet lining with the lamp-light gloating o'er.
She shall press, ah, nevermore!
Then, methought, the air grew denser, perfumed from an unseen censer
Swung by seraphim whose footfalls tinkled on the tufted floor.
"Wretch," I cried, " thy God hath lent thee — by these angels he hath
sent thee
Respite — respite and nepenthe from thy memories of Lenore!
Quaff, oh, quaff this kind nepenthe, and forget this lost Lenore! "
Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."
" Prophet! " said I, " thing of evil! — prophet still, if bird or devil!
Whether Tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore.
Desolate, yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted —
On this home by horror haunted — tell me truly, I implore —
Is there — is there balm in Gilead ? — tell me — tell me, I implore!"
Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."
" Prophet!" said I, "thing of evil — prophet still, if bird or devil!
By that Heaven that bends above us — by that God we both adore —
Tell this soul with sorrow laden if, within the distant Aidenn,
It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels name Lenore —
Clasp a rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore."
Quoth tiie Raven, "Nevermore."
" Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend ! " I shrieked, upstarting —
" (iet thee back into the tempest and the night's Plutonian shore!
Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken!
Leave my loneliness unbroken! — quit the bust above my door!
Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door! "
Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."
And the Raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting
On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door;
And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming.
And the lamp-light o'er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor.
And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor
Shall be lifted — nevermore !
428 POLLOK.
Robert
POLLOK.
[From The Course of Time.]
Then turned, and with the grass-
LORD BY HON.
hopper, who sung
His evening song beneath his feet.
He touched his harp, and nations
conversed.
heard, entranced.
Suns, moons, and stars, and clouds.
As some vast river of unfailing
his sisters were ;
source,
Rocks, mountains, meteors, seas, and
liapid, exhaustless, deep, his num-
winds, and storms.
bers flowed.
His brothers, younger brothers, whom
And oped new fountains in the hu-
he scarce
man heart.
As equals deemed. All passions of
AVliere Fancy halted, weary in her
all men.
flight,
The wild and tame, the gentle and
In other men, his, fresli as morning.
severe ;
rose
All thoughts, all maxims, sacred and
And soared untrodden heights, and
profane ;
seemed at home.
All creeds, all seasons, Time, Eter-
Wliere angels basliful looked. Oth-
nity;
ers, thougli great
All that was hated, all too, that was
Beneath their argument seemed
dear ;
struggling wliiles;
All that was hoped, all that was
He from above descending stooped to
feared, by man;
touch
He tossed about, as tempest-with-
Tlie loftiest thought; and proudly
ered leaves.
stooped, as though
Then, smiling, looked upon the wreck
It scarce deserved his verse. With
he macle.
Nature's self
With terror now he froze the cower-
He seemed an olil acquaintance, free
ing blood,
to jest
And now dissolved the heart in ten-
At will with all her glorious majesty.
derness ;
He laid his hand upon " the Ocean's
Yet would not tremble, would not
mane."
weep himself ;
And played familiar with his hoary
But back into his soul retired.
locks ; [ennines.
alone.
Stood on the Alps, stood on the Ap-
Dark, sullen, proud, gazing contempt-
And witli the thunder talked, as
uously
friend to friend ;
On hearts and passions prostrate at
And wove his garland of the light-
his feet.
ning's wing.
So Ocean from the plains his waves
In sportive twist, the lightning's
had late
fiery wing,
To desolation swept, retired in
Which, as tlie footsteps of the dread-
pride.
ful God,
Exulting in the glory of his might.
Marching upon the storm in ven-
And seemed to mock the ruin he had
geance, seemed;
wrought.
POPE.
429
Alexander Pope.
FROM ''ELOISA TO ABELAJH)."
In these deep solitudes and awful
cells.
Where heavenly-pensive Contempla-
tion dwells,
And ever-musing melancholy reigns;
Wliat means this tumult in a vestal's
veins '?
Why rove my thoughts beyond this
last retreat ?
Why feels my heart its long-forgot-
ten heat ?
Yet, yet I love! — From Abelard it
came,
And Eloisa yet must kiss the name.
Dear fatal name ! rest ever unre-
vealed.
Nor pass these lips, in holy silence
sealed : [disguise.
Hide it, my heart, within that close
Where, mixed with God's, his loved
idea lies :
write it not, my hand — the name
appears [tears !
Already written — wash it out, my
In vain lost Eloisa weeps and prays.
Her heart still dictates, and lier hand
obeys.
Relentless walls! whose darksome
round contains
Repentant sighs, and voluntary pains :
Ye rugged rocks, which holy knees
liave worn:
Ye grots and caverns shagged with
horrid thorn !
Shrines ! wliere their vigils pale-eyed
virgins keep.
And pitying saints, whose statues
learn to weep !
Though cold like you, unmoved and
silent grown,
1 have not yet forgot myself to stone.
All is not Heaven's while Abelard
has part,
Still rebel nature holds out half my
heart ;
Nor prayers nor fasts its stubborn
pulse restrain, [vain.
Nor tears for ages taught to flow in
Soon as thy letters trembling I un-
close,
That well-known name awakens all
my woes.
Oh, name, for ever sad! for ever
dear !
Still breatlied in sighs, still ushered
with a tear.
I tremble, too, whene'er my own 1
find;
Some dire misfortune follows close
behind.
Line after line my gusliing eyes o'er-
flow,
Led through a sad variety of woe :
Now warm in love, now withering in
my bloom.
Lost in a convent's solitary gloom!
There stern religion quenched the
unwilling flame.
There died the best of passions, love
and fame.
Yet write, oh ! write me all, that 1
may join
Griefs to thy griefs, and echo sighs
to thine.
Nor foes nor fortune take this power
away ;
And is my Abelard less kind than
they ?
Tears still are mine, and those I need
not spare.
Love but demands what else were
shed in prayer;
No happier task these faded eyes
pursue ;
To read and weep is all they now can
do.
Then share thy pain, allow that
sad relief;
Ah, more tlian share it! give me all
thy grief.
Heaven first tauglit letters for some
wretch's aid.
Some banished lover, or some cap-
tive maid;
They live, they speak, they breathe
what love inspires.
Warm from the soul, and faithful to
its Hres,
430
POPE.
The virgin's wisli without hei' fears
impart,
Excuse tlie blusli, and pour out all
the heart,
Speed the soft intercourse from soul
to soul,
And waft a sigh from Indus to the
Pole.
[From An Essay on Man.^
MAN.
Kkow then thyself, presume not
God to scan,
The proper study of mankind is Man.
Placed on this isthmus of a middle
state,
A being darkly wise, and rudely
great ;
With too much knowledge for the
sceptic side,
With too much weakness for the sto-
ic's pride.
He hangs between; in doubt to act or
rest ;
In doubt to deem himself a god, or
beast ;
In doubt his mind or body to prefer;
Born but to die, and reasoning but
to err;
Alike in ignorance, his reason such.
Whether he thinks too little, or too
much ;
Chaos of thought and passion, all
confused
Still by himself abused, or disabused;
Created half to rise, and half to fall ;
Great lord of all things, yet a prey to
all;
Sole judge of truth, in endless error
hurled :
The glory, jest, and riddle of the
world !
[From An Essay on Man.]
.'iUBMISSIOX rO SUPREME WIS-
DOM.
What if the foot, ordained the
dust to tread.
Or hand, to toil, aspired to be the
head ?
AVhat if the head, the eye, or ear re-
pined
To serve mere engines to the ruling
mind ?
Just as absurd for any part to claim
To be another, in this general frame:
Just as absurd, to mourn the tasks
or pains.
The great directing Mind of All
ordains.
All are but parts of one stupendous
whole,
Whose body nature is, and God the
soul ;
That, changed through all, and yet
in all the same,
Great in the earth, as in the ethereal
frame, [breeze,
Warms in the sun, refreshes in the
Glows ill the stars, and blossoms in
the trees;
Lives through all life, extends
through ail extent,
Spreads undivided, operates unspent ;
Breathes in our soul, informs our
mortal part.
As full, as perfect, in a hair as heart;
As full, as perfect, in vile man that
mourns.
As the rapt seraph, that adores and
burns ;
To Him no high, no low, no great,
no small ;
He fills. He bounds, connects, and
ecjuals all.
Cease then, nor order imperfec-
tion name:
(3ur proper bliss depends on what we
blame.
Know thy own point: this kind, this
due degree
Of blindness, weakness. Heaven be-
stows on thee.
Submit. — In this, or any other
sphere.
Secure to be as blest as thou canst
bear :
Safe in the hand of one disposing
power.
Or in the natal, or the mortal hour.
All nature is but art, unknown to
thee ;
All chance, direction, which thou
canst not see ;
POPE.
431
All discord, harmony not understood;
All partial evil, universal good:
And, spite of pride, in erring reason's
spite,
One truth is clear, Whatever is, is
riijht.
[From Ah Essay on Man.]
CHARITY, GRADUALLY PERVA-
SIVE.
(iOD loves from whole to parts;
but human soul
Must rise from individual to the
whole.
Self-love but serves the virtuous
mind to wake.
As the small pebble stirs the peaceful
lake ;
The centre moved, a circle straight
succeeds.
Another still, and still another
spreads ;
Friend, parent, neighbor, first it will
embrace ;
His country next, and next all human
race ;
Wide, and more wide, the o'ei'flow-
ings of the mind
Take every creature in, of every
kind ;
Earth smiles around, with boundless
bounty blest,
And heaven beholds its image in his
breast.
[From An Essay on Man.]
TRUE NOBILITY.
Honor and shame from no condi-
tion rise ;
Act well your part, there all the
honor lies.
Fortune in men has some small dif-
ference made.
One flaunts in rags, one flutters in
brocade ;
The cobbler aproned, and the parson
gowned,
Hie friar hooded, and the monarch
crowned.
''What differ more (you cry) than
crown and cowl! "
I'll tell you, friend! a wise man and
a fool.
You'll find, if once the monarch acts
the monk,
Or, cobbler-like, the parson will be
drunk,
Worth makes the man, and want of
it the fellow;
The rest is all but leather or prunello.
\_From An Essay on Man.]
VIRTUE. THE SOLE UNFAILING
HAPPINESS.
Know then this truth (enough for
man to know ) ,
" Virtue alone is happiness below."
The only point where human bliss
stands still.
And tastes the good without the fall
to ill; [ceives,
AVliere only merit constant pay re-
Is blest in what it takes, and what it
gives ;
The joy unequalled, if its end it gain,
And if it lose, attended with no jjain:
Without satiety, though e'er so blest,
And but more relished as the more
distressed :
The broadest mirth, unfeeling Folly
wears, [tears:
Less pleasing far than Virtue's very
Good, from each object, from each
place acquired.
For ever exercised, yet never tired :
Never elated, while one man's op-
pressed ;
Never dejected, while another's
blessed ;
And where no wants, no wishes can
remain,
Since but to wish more virtue, is to
gain.
See the sole bliss. Heaven could on
all bestow I
Which who but feels can taste, but
thinks can know:
Yet poor with fortune, and with
learning blind.
The bad must miss; the good, un-
taught, will find;
■132
POPE.
Slave to no sect, who takes no private
road,
Bnt looks throngli nature up to na-
ture's God;
Pursues that chain which links the
immense design,
Joins heaven and earth, and mortal
and divine;
Sees that no being any bliss can
know.
But touches some above, and some
below;
Learns from this union of tlie rising
whole,
The first, last purpose of the human
soul ;
And knows where faith, law, morals,
all began,
All end, in love of God and love of
man.
[From An Essay on CrUieism.']
TRUTH TO NATURE.
FiusT follow Nature, and yoiu" judg-
ment frame
By her just standard, which is still
the same ;
Unerring Nature, still divinely bright.
One clear, unchanged, and universal
light.
Life, force, and beauty, must to all
impart.
At once the source, and end, and
test of art.
\_From An Essay on CrUieism.]
JUST JUDGMENT.
Whoever thinks a faultless piece
to see,
Thinks what ne'er was, nor is, nor
e'er shall be.
In every work regard the writer's
end.
Since none can compass more than
they intend;
And if the means be just, the con-
duct true.
Applause, in spite of trivial faults, is
due.
As men of breeding, sometimes men
of wit.
To avoid great errors, must the less
commit;
Neglect the rules each verbal critic
lays,
For not to know some trifles is a
praise.
[From An Essay on Crificism.]
JFIT.
TiiUE wit is nature to advantage
dressed ;
What oft was thought, but ne'er so
well expressed:
Something, whose truth, convinced
at sight we find,
That gives us back the image of our
mind.
As shades more sweetly reconnnend
the light.
So modest plainness sets off sprightly
wit.
For works may have more wit than
does them good.
As bodies perish through excess of
blood.
[From An Essay on Criticism.]
EXCESSIVE PRAISE OR BLAME.
Avoid extremes; and shun the
fault of such
Who still are pleased too little or too
much.
At every trifle scorn to take offence.
That always shows great pride or
little sense:
Those heads, as stomachs, are not
sure the best
Which nauseate all, and nothing can
digest.
Yet let not each gay turn tliy rapture
move :
For fools admire, but men of sense
approve :
As things seem large which we
through mist descry,
Dulness is ever apt to magnify.
PBESCOTT.
433
THE UyiVEliSAL PRAYER.
Father of all! in every age,
In every clime adored,
By saint, by savage, and by sage,
Jehovah, Jove, or Lord !
Thou great First Cause, least under-
stood,
Who all my sense confined
To know but this, that Thou art good.
And that myself am blind;
Yet gave me, in this dark estate,
To see the good from ill;
And binding nature fast in fate.
Left free the human will.
What conscience dictates to be done,
( )r warns me not to do.
This, teach me more than hell to
shun,
That, more than heaven pursue.
What blessings Thy free bounty
gives,
Let ine not cast away ;
For Goil is paid when man receives ;
To enjoy is to obey.
Yet not to earth's contracted span
Thy goodness let me bound,
Or think Thee Lord alone of man,
\Vhen thousand worlds are round.
Let not this weak, unknowing hand
I'resume thy bolts to throw.
And deal danniation round the land
On each 1 judge Thy foe.
If I am right. Thy grace impart
Still in the right to stay ;
If 1 am wrong, oh, teach my heart
To find tha^ better way !
Save me alike from foolish pride.
Or impious discontent,
At avight Thy wisdom has denied,
Or aught Thy goodness lent.
Teach me to feel another's woe.
To hide the fault I see:
That mercy 1 to others show,
That mercy show to me.
Mean though I am, not wholly so.
Since quickened by Thy breath ;
Oh, lead me wheresoe'er I go.
Through this day's life or death!
This day, be bread and peace my lot:
All else beneath the sun.
Thou know'st if best bestowed or not.
And let Thy will be done.
To Thee, whose temple is all spaee.
Whose altar, earth, sea, skies !
One chorus let all Being raise !
All Nature's incense "rise !
Mary N. Prescott.
THE OLD STORY.
By the pleasant paths we know
All familiar flowers would grow.
Though we two were gone;
Moon anil stars would rise and set.
Dawn the laggard night forget,
And the world move on.
Spring would carol through the wood,
Life be counted sweet and good,
Winter storms would prove their
While the seasons sped ; [might.
Winter frosts make bold to bite.
Clouds lift overhead.
Still the sunset liglits would glow,
Still the heaven-appointed bow
In its place be himg;
Not one flower the less would bloom.
Though we two had met our doom.
No song less be sung.
Other lovers through the dew
Would go, loitering, two and two.
When the day was done ;
Lips would pass the kiss divine.
Hearts would beat like yours and
mine, —
Hearts that beat as one.
434
PRESTON.
TO-DAY.
To-day the sunshine freely showers
Its benediction where we stand ;
There's not a passing cloud that
lowers
Above this pleasant summer land ;
Then let's not waste the sweet to-
day, —
To-morrow, who can say '.'
Perhaps, to-morrow we may be, —
Alas! alas! the thought is pain, —
As far apart as sky and sea.
Sundered to meet no more again ;
Then let us clasp thee, sweet to-
day, —
To-morrow, who can say ?
The daylight fades ; a purple dream
Of twilight hovers overhead.
While all the trembling stars but seem
Like sad tears yet unshed :
Oh, sweet to-day, so soon away !
To-morrow, who can say '?
ISouND asleep! no sigh can reach
Him who dreams the heavenly
dream ;
No to-morrow's silver speech
Wake him with an earthly theme.
Summer rains, relentlessly,
Patter where his head doth lie.
There the wild rose and the brake
All their summer leisiu-e take.
Violets, blinded by the dew,
Perfume lend to the sad rue.
Till the day break fair and clear,
And no shadow doth appear.
Margaret Junkin Preston.
EQUIPOISE.
Just when we think we've fixed the
golden mean. —
The diamond point, on which to
balance fair
Life and life's lofty issues, weigh-
ing there,
With fractional precision, close and
keen.
Thought, motive, word and deed, —
there conies between
Some wayward circumstance, some
jostling care.
Some temper's fret, some mood's
unwise despair,
To mar the equilibrium, imforeseen,
And spoil our nice adjustment ! —
Happy he.
Whose soul's calm equipoise can
know no jar,
Because the unwavering hand that
holds the scales,
Is the same hand that weighed each
steadfast star, —
Is the same hand that on the sa-
cred tree [nails!
Bore, for his sake, the anguish of the
ouns.
Most perfect attribute of love, that
knows
No separate self, — no conscious
i»hic nor thine :
But mystic union, closer, more di-
vine [close.
Than wedded soul and body can dis-
No flush of pleasure on thy forehead
glows.
No mist of feeling in thine eyes can
shine.
No faintest pain surprise thee, but
there goes
The lightntng-spark along love's
viewless line,
Bearing Avith instant message to
my heart,
Besponsive recognition. Suns or
showers
May come between us; silences
may part ;
The rushing world know not, nor
care to know ; —
Yet back and forth the flashing
secrets go.
Whose sacred, only sesame is, o?()-.s- .'
PRESTON.
435
XATURE'ti LESSOK.
Pain is no longer pain when it is
past ;
And what is all the mirth of yes-
terday,
More than the yester flush that
paled away,
Leaving no trace across the landscape
cast
Whereby to prove its presence
there '? The blast
That bowed the knotted oak beneath
its sway,
And rent the lissome ash. the forest
may
Take heed of longer, since strewn
leaves outlast
Strewn sunbeams even. Be thoi^ like
Nature then.
Calmly receptive of all sweet de-
lights.
The while they soothe and strengthen
thee: and when
The wrench of trial comes with
swirl and strain.
Think of the still progressive days
and nights,
That blot with equal sweep, both
joy and pain.
GOD'S PATIENCE.
Of all the attril)utes Avhose starry
rays
Converge and centre in one focal
light
Of luminous glory such as angels'
sight
Can only look on with a blenched
a)naze,
None crowns the brow of God with
purer blaze,
Xor lifts His grandeur to more infi-
nite height.
Than His exhaustless patience. Let
us praise
With wondering hearts, this strangest
tenderest grace,
Kemembering, awe-struck, that the
avenging rod
Of justice must have fallen, and mer-
cy's plan
Been frustrate, had not Patience
stood between,
Divinely meek: And let us learn
that man.
Toiling, enduring, pleading, — calm,
serene,
For those M'ho scorn and slight, is
likest God.
THE SHADOW.
It comes betwixt me and the ame-
thyst
Of yon far mountain's billowy
range; — the sky,
Mild with sun-setting calmness, to
my eye
Is curtained ever by its haunting
mist;
And oftentimes when some dear
brow I've kissed.
My lips grow tremulous as it sweeps
me by.
With stress of overmastering agony
That faith and reason all in vain
resist.
It blurs my fairest books ; it dims the
page
Of the divinest loi'c; and on my
tongue
The broken prayer that inward
strength would crave,
Dissolves in sobs no soothing can as-
suage ;
And this penumbral gloom. — this
heart-cloud flung
Aroimd me is, the memory of a grave.
STONEWALL JACKSON'S GliAVE.
A SIMPLE, sodded mound of earth.
Without a line above it ;
With only daily votive flowers
To prove that any love it :
The token flag that silently
Each breeze's visit numbers.
Alone keeps martial ward above
The hero's dreamless slumbers.
No name ? — no record ? Ask the
world ;
The world has read his story : —
If all its annals can unfold
A prouder tale of glory ;
If ever merely human life
Hath taught diviner moral, —
If ever round a worthier brow
Was twined a purer laurel !
A twelvemonth only, since his sword
Went flashing through the battle, —
A twelvemonth only, since his ear
Heard war's last deadly rattle, —
And yet, have countless pilgrim feet
The pilgrim's guerdon paid him,
And weeping women come to see
The place where they have laid
him.
Contending armies bring in turn,
Their meed of praise or honor.
And Pallas here has paused to bind
The cypress-wreath upon her:
It seems a holy sepulchre.
Whose sanctities can waken
Alike the love of friend or foe —
Of Christian or of pagan.
But who shall weigh the wordless
grief
That leaves in tears its traces.
As round their leader crowd again
The bronzed and veteran faces ?
The "Old Brigade" he loved so
well —
The mountain men, who bound
him
With bays of their own winning, ere
A tardier fame had crowned him;
The legions who had seen his glance
Across the carnage flashing
And thrilled to catch his ringing
" cliarge "
Above the volley crashing; —
Who oft had watched the lifted hand,
The inward trust betraying,
And felt their courage grow sublime.
While they beheld him praying!
Eare fame ! rare name ! — If chanted
praise,
With all the world to listen, —
If pride that swells a nation's soul, —
If foemen's tears that glisten, —
If ijilgrim's shrining love, — if grief
Which naught may soothe or
sever, —
If these can consecrate, — this spot
Is sacred ground forever!
THERE'LL COME A DAY.
There'll come a day when the
supremest splendor
Of earth, or sky, or sea,
Whate'er their miracles, sublime or
tender.
Will wake no joy in me.
There'll come a day when all the as-
piration,
Now with such fervor fraught ,
As lifts to heights of breathless exal-
tation.
Will seem a thing of naught.
There'll come a day when riches,
honor, glory.
Music and song and art.
Will look like puppets in a worn-out
story.
Where each has played his part.
There'll come a day when human
love, the sweetest
Gift that includes the whole
Of God's grand giving — sovereign-
est. completest —
Shall fail to till my soul.
There'll come a day — I will not care
how ]iasses
The cloud across my sight.
If only, lark-like, from earth's nested
grasses,
I spring to meet its light.
THE TYRANNY OF MOOD.
I. MORNING.
It is enough: I feel, this golden
morn,
As if a royal appanage were mine.
Through Nature's queenly warrant
of divine |born,
Investiture. What princess, palace-
PRINGLE.
431
Hath right of rapture more, when
skies adorn
Tlieinselves so grandly; wlien the
mountains sliine
Transfigured ; when tlie air exalts
like wine;
When pearly purples steep the yel-
lowing corn '?
So satisfied with all the goodliness
Of God's good world, — my being
to its brim
Surcharged with litter thankfulness
no less [glad
Than bliss of beauty, passionately
Through rush of tears that leaves the
landscape dim, —
"Who dares," 1 say, "in such a
world be sad '^ ''
II. NIGHT.
I PRESS my cheek against the win-
dow-pane.
And gaze abroad into the blank,
black space
Where earth and sky no more have
any place,
Wiped from existence by the expung-
ing rain ;
And as I hear the worried Minds
complain,
A darkness, darker than the mirk
whose trace
Invades the curtained room, is on my
face.
Beneath Mhicli, life and life's best
ends seem vain.
My swelling aspirations viewless
sink
As yon cloud-blotted hills: hopes
that shone bright
As planets yester-eve, like them to-
night
Are gulfed, the impenetrable mists
before :
"' O weary world!" I cry, "how
dare I think
Thou hast for me one gleam of
gladness more ? "
Thomas Pringle.
AFAR IN THE DESEIiT.
Afar in the desert I love to ride.
With the silent bush-boy alone by
my side.
When the sorrows of life the soul
o'ercast,
And, sick of the present, I cling to
the past ;
When the eye is suffused with regret-
ful tears.
From the fond recollections of former
years ;
And shadows of things that have
long since fled
Flit over the brain, like the ghosts of
the dead ;
Bright visions of glory that vanished
too soon;
Day-dreams that departed ere man-
hood's noon; [reft;
Attachments by fate or falsehood
Companions of early days lost or
left —
And my native land — whose magi-
cal name
Thrills to the heart like electric flame ;
The home of my childhood : the
haunts of my prime:
All the ])assions and scenes of that
ra])turous time
When the feelings were young, and
the Morld was new,
Like the fresh bowers of Eden un-
folding to view;
Ah — all now forsaken — forgotten —
foregone! [none —
And I — a lone exile remembered of
My high aims abandoned — my good
acts undone —
Aweary of all that is under the sun, —
AVith that sadness of lieart which no
stranger may scan,
I fly to the desert afar from man.
Afar in the desert I love to ride.
With the silent bush-boy alone by
my side,
438
FEINGLE.
When the wild turmoil of this weari-
some life,
With its scenes of oppression, cor-
ruption, and strife —
The proud man's frown, and the base
man's fear —
The scorner's laugh, and the suffer-
er's tear —
And malice, and meanness, and
falsehood and folly,
Dispose me to musing and dark mel-
ancholy ;
When my bosom is full, and my
thoughts are high.
And my soul is sick with the bond-
man's sigh —
Oh! then there is freedom, and joy
and pride.
Afar in the desert alone to ride !
There is rapture to vault on the
champing steed.
And to bound away with the eagle's
speed.
With the death-fraught firelock in
my hand —
The only law of the desert land !
Afar in the desert I love to ride,
AVith the silent bush-boy alone by my
side,
Away — away from the dwellings of
men.
By the wild deer's haunt, by the buf-
falo's glen;
By valleys remote where the oriby
plays
Where the gnu, the gazelle, and the
hartebeest graze.
And the kudu and eland unhunted
recline
By the skirts of gray forest o'erhimg
with wild vine I
Where the elephant browses at peace
in his wood.
And the river-horse gambols unscared
in the flood.
And the mighty rhinoceros wallows
at will
In the fen where the wild ass is
drinking his fill.
Afar in the desert I love to ride.
With the silent bush-boy alone by my
side.
O'er the brown karroo, where the
bleating ci-y
Of the springbok's fawn sounds plain-
tively ;
And the timorous quagga's shrill
whistling neigh
Is heard by the foimtain at twilight
gray;
Where the zebra wantonly tosses his
mane.
With wild hoof scouring the desolate
plain ;
And the fleet-footed ostrich over the
waste
Speeds like a horseman who travels
in haste,
Hieing away to the home of her rest.
Where she and her mate have scoojjed
their nest,
Far hid from the pitiless plunderer's
view
In the pathless depths of the parched
karroo.
Afar in the desert I love to ride.
With tlie silent bush-boy alone by
my side.
Away — away — in the wilderness
vast.
Where the white man's foot hath
never passed.
And the quivered Coranna or Bech-
uan
Hath rarely crossed with his roving
clan ;
A region of emptiness, howling and
drear.
Which man hath abandoned from
famine and fear;
Which the snake and the lizard in-
habit alone,
W^ith the twilight bat from the yawn-
ing stone ;
Where grass, nor herb, nor shrub
takes root.
Save poisonous thorns that pierce
the foot :
And the bitter-melon, for food and
drink.
Is the pilgrim's fare by the salt-lake's
brink;
A region of drought, where no river
glides,
Nor rippling brook with osiered sides;
Where sedgy pool, nor bubbling
fount,
Xor tree, nor cloud, nor misty mount.
Appears, to refresh the aching eye ;
But the barren earth and the burning
sky, [round,
And the blank horizon, round and
iSpread — void of living sight or
sound.
And here, while the night-winds
round me sigh,
And the stars burn bright in the mid-
night sky.
As I sit apart by the desert stone,
Like Elijah at Horeb's cave, alone,
"A still small voice" comes through
the wild
(Like a father consoling his fretful
child).
Which banishes bitterness, wrath,
and fear, —
Saying — Man is distant, but God is
near!
Matthew Prior.
[From Solomon.]
THE WISE MAK IN DARKNESS.
Happy the mortal man, who now at
last
Has through the doleful vale of mis-
ery jiassed ;
Who to his destined stage has carried
on
The tedious load, and laid his bur-
dens down;
Whom the cut brass or mounded mar-
ble shows
Victor o"er life and all her train of
woes.
He happier yet, who, iirivileged by
fate
To shorter labor, and a lighter
weight,
Eeceived but yesterday the gift of
breath.
Ordered to-morrow to return to
death.
But oh! beyond description, happiest
he
Who ne'er must roll on life's tumul-
tuous sea ;
Who with blessed freedom from the
general doom
Exempt, must never force the teem-
ing womb,
Nor see the sun, nor sink into the
tomb.
Who breathes must suffer ; and who
thinks must mourn;
And he alone is blest who ne'er was
born.
[From Solomon.]
THE WISE MAN IN LIGHT.
Supreme, all- wise, eternal Poten-
tate!
Sole Author, sole Dispenser of our
fate!
Enthroned in light and immor-
tality!
Whom no man fully sees, and none
can see !
Original of beings ! Power divine !
Since that I live, and that I think, is
Thine;
Benign Creator, let Thy plastic hand
Dispose its own effect. Let Thy com-
mand
Restore, great Father, Thy instructed
son;
And in my act, may Thy great will
be done!
440
PROCTER.
Adelaide Anne Procter.
ONE BY ONE.
One by one the sands are flowing,
One by one the moments fall ;
Some are coming, some are going.
Do not strive to grasp them all.
One by one thy duties wait thee,
Let thy whole strength go to each,
Let no future dreams elate thee.
Learn thou lirst what these can
teach.
One by one (bright gifts from Heav-
en)
Joys are sent thee here below ;
Take them readily when given,
Eeady too to let them go.
One by one thy griefs shall meet
thee.
Do not fear an armed band ;
One will fade as others greet thee;
Shadows passing through the land.
Do not look at life's long sorrow;
See how small each moment's pain,
God will help thee for to-morrow,
So each day begin again.
Every hour that fleets so slowly
Has its task to do or bear;
Lmninous the crown, and holy.
When each gem is set with care.
Do not linger Avith regretting,
Or for passing hours despond ;
Nor, the daily toil forgetting.
Look too eagerly beyond.
Hours are golden links, God's token.
Reaching heaven ; but one by one
Take thern, lest the chain be broken
Ere the pilgrimage be done.
JUDGE NOT.
Judge not ; the workings of his brain
And of his heart thou canst not
see;
Wbat looks to thy dim eyes a stain,
In God's pure light may only be
A scar, brought from some well-won
held,
Where thou wouldst only faint and
yield.
The look, the air, that frets thy sight,
May be a token, that below
The soul has closed in deadly fight
With some infernal fiery foe,"
Whose glance would scorch thy smil-
ing grace.
And cast thee shuddering on thy face !
The fall thou darest to despise, —
May be the angel's slackened hand
Has suffered it, that he may rise
And take a firmer, surer stand ;
Or, trusting less to earthly things.
May hencefortli learn to use his
wings.
And judge none lost; but wait and
see.
With hopeful pity, not disdain ;
The depth of the abyss may be
The measure of the height of
pain
And love and glory that may raise
This soul to God in after days !
THANKF ULNESS.
My
God, I tliank Thee who hast
made
The earth so bright;
So full of splendor and of joy,
Beauty and light;
So many glorious things are here.
Noble and right !
I thank Thee, too, that Thou hast
made
Joy to abound ;
So many gentle thoughts and deeds
Circling us round,
That in the darkest spot of earth
Some love is found.
PROCTER.
441
I thank Thee more that all our joy
Is touched with pain;
That shadows fall on brightest hours ;
That thorns remain ;
So that earth's bliss may be oiu-
guide.
And not our chain.
For Thou who knowest, Lord, how
soon
Our weak heart clings,
Hast given us joys, tender and true,
Yet all with wings,
So that we see, gleaming on high.
Diviner things !
I thank Thee, Lord, that Thou hast
kept
The best in store ;
We have enough, yet not too much
To long for more :
A yearning for a deeper peace.
Not kno^\■n before.
I thank Thee. Lord, that here our
soids
Though amply blest,
Can never find, although they seek,
A perfect rest. —
Xor ever shall, until they lean
On Jesus' breast!
A LOST CHORD.
Seated one day at the organ,
I was weary and ill at ease.
And my fingers wandered idly
Over the noisy keys.
I do not know what I was playing,
Or what I was dreaming then ;
But I struck one chord of music.
Like the sound of a great Amen.
It flooded the crimson twilight,
Like the close of an angel's psalm.
And it lay on my fevered spirit
With a touch of infinite calm.
It quieted pain and sorrow.
Like love overcoming strife;
It seemed the harmonious echo
From our discordant life.
It linked all perplexed meanings
Into one perfect peace.
And trembled away into silence
As if it were loth to cease.
I have sought, but I seek it vainly.
That one lost chord divine.
That came from the soul of the organ,
And entered into mine.
It may be that death's bright angel
AVill speak in that chord again.
It may be that only in heaven
I shall hear that grand Amen.
TOO LATE.
Hush! speak low; tread softly;
Draw the sheet aside ; —
Yes, she does look peaceful;
With that smile she died.
Yet stern want and sorrow
Even now you trace
On the wan, worn features
Of the still white face.
Eestless, helpless, hopeless,
Was her bitter part ; —
Now, — how still the violets
Lie upon her heart !
She who toiled and labored
For her daily bread ;
See the velvet hangings
Of this stately bed.
Yes, they did forgive her;
Brought her home at last;
Strove to cover over
Their relentless past.
Ah, they woidd have given
Wealth, and home, and pride,
To see her just look happy
Once before she died !
They strove hard to please her,
But, when death is near.
All you know is deadened,
Hope, and joy, and fear.
And besides, one sorrow
Deeper still, — one pain
Was beyond thom : healing
Came lo-day, — in vain!
If she liad but lingered
Just a few hours more;
Or had this letter readied her
Just one day before!
I can almost pity
Even him to-day ;
Though he let this anguish
Eat her heart away.
Yet she never blamed him : —
One day you shall know
How this sorrow liappened ;
It was long ago.
I have read the letter;
Many a weary year,
For one word slie hungered, —
There are thousands here.
If she could but hear it.
Could but understand ;
See, — I put tlie letter
In lier cold white hand.
Even these words, so longed for,
Do not stir her rest;
Well, I should not murmur.
For God judges best.
She needs no more pity, —
But I mourn his fate,
When he hears his letter
Came a day too late.
CLEASSIXG FIRES.
Let thy gold be cast in the furnace,
Tliy red gold, precious and briglit,
Do not fear the hungry fire.
With its caverns of burning light;
And thy gold shall return more pre-
cious,
Free from every spot and stain ;
For gold must be tried by fire,
As a heart must be tried by pain I
In the cruel fire of sorrow.
Cast thy heart, do not faint or wail ;
Let thy hand be firm and steady,
Do not let thy spirit quail:
But wait till the trial is over,
And take thy heart again ;
For as gold is tried by fire.
So a heart must be tried by pain!
I shall know by the gleam and glitter
Of the golden chain you wear.
By your heart's calm strength in lov-
ing-
Of the fire they have had to bear.
Beat on. true heart, forever;
Shine bright, strong golden chain;
And bless the cleansing fire,
And the furnace of living pain!
A WOMAN- S QUESTIOX.
Befoke I trust my fate to thee,
Or place my hand in thine,
Before I let thy future give
Color and form to mine,
Before I peril all for thee,
Question thy soul to-night for me.
I break all slighter bonds, nor feel
A shadow of regret:
Is there one link within the past
That holds thy spirit yet ?
Or is thy faith as clear and free
As that which I can pledge to
thee ?
Does there within thy dimmest
dreams
A possible future shine.
Wherein thy life could henceforth
breathe.
Untouched, unshared by mine "'
If so, at any pain or cost,
Oh, tell me before all is lost.
Look deeper still. If thou canst feel
AVitliin thy inmost soul.
That thou hast kept a portion back.
While I have staked tlie whole ;
Let no false pity spare the blow,
But in true mercy tell me so.
PROCTER.
443
Is there within thy heart a need
That mine cannot fulfil ?
One chonl that any other hand
Could hetter wake or still ?
Speak now, — lest at some future day
My whole life wither and decay.
Lives there within thy nature hid
The demon-spirit Change,
Shedding a passing glory still
Ou all things new and strange ?
It may not be thy fault alone, —
But shield my heart against thy
own.
Couldst thou withdraw thy hand one
flay.
iVnd answer to my claim,
That fate, and that to-day's mistake.
Not thou, — had been to blame ?
Some soothe their conscience thus ; but
thou
Wilt surely warn and save me now.
Nay, answer not, — I dare not hear.
The words would come too late;
Yet I would spare thee all remorse,
So, comfort thee, my fate, —
Whatever on my heart may fall, —
Kemember, I vjould risk it all!
IXCOMPLE TEN ESS.
Nothing resting in its own complete-
ness
Can have worth or beauty : but alone
Because it leads and tends to farther
sweetness.
Fuller, higher, deeper than its own.
Spring's real glory dwells not in the
meaning.
Gracious though it be, of her blue
hours ;
But is hidden in her tender leaning
To the summer's richer wealth of
flowers.
Dawn is fair, because the mists fade
slowly
Into day, which floods the world
with light;
Twilight's mystery is so sweet and
holy
Just because it ends in starry night.
Childhood's smiles unconscious
graces borrow
From strife, that in a far-off future
lies ;
And angel glances (veiled now by
life's sorrow)
Draw our hearts to some beloved
eyes.
Life is only bright when it proceedeth
Towards a truer, deeper life above ;
Human love is sweetest when it lead-
eth
To a more divine and perfect love.
Learn the mystery of progression
duly:
Do not call each glorious change, de-
cay;
But know we only hold our treasures
truly,
^Vhen it seems as if they passed
away.
Nor dare to blame God's gifts for in-
completeness ;
In that want their beauty lies : they
roll
Towards some infinite de^Jth of love
and sweetness,
Bearing onward man's reluctant
soul.
STRIVE, WAIT, AND PJiAY.
Strive : yet I do not promise
The prize you dream of to-day
Will not fade when you think to
grasp it.
And melt in your hand away ;
But another and holier treasure,
You would now perchance disdain,
Will come when your toil is over.
And pay you for all your pain.
Wait ; yet I do not tell you
The hour you long for now
Will not come with its radiance van-
ished.
And a shadow upon its brow ;
Yet far through the misty future,
With a crown of starry light,
An hour of joy you Ivuow not
Is winging her silent flight.
Pray ; thougli the gift you ask for
May never comfort yom* fears,
May never repay your pleading,
Yet pray, and with hopeful
tears ;
An answer, not that you long for,
But diviner, will come one day;
Your eyes are too dim to see it.
Yet strive, and wait, and pray.
Bryan Waller Procter (Barry Cornwall).
LIFE.
We are born; we laugh; we weep;
We love; we droop; we die I
Ah! wherefore do we laugh or weep ?
Why do we live or die '?
Who knows that secret deep ?
Alas, not I !
"Why doth the violet spring
Unseen by human eye ?
Why do the radiant seasons bring
Sweet thoughts that quickly fly ?
Why do our fond hearts cling
To things that die ?
We toil — through pain and wrong;
We fight — and fly ;
We love; we lose; and then, ere
long,
Stone-dead we lie.
O Life! is all thy song!
'' Endure and — die?"
A PETITION TO TIME.
To ITCH US gently. Time!
Let US glide adown thy stream
Gently — as we sometimes glide
Tlirough a quiet dream!
Ilmnble voyagers are we.
Husband, wife, and children three —
(One is lost — an angel, fled
To the azure overhead!)
Touch us gently, Time!
We've not proud nor soaring wings ;
Our ambition, our content,
Lies in simple things.
Humble voyagers are we.
O'er life's dim unsounded sea.
Seeking only some calm clime;
Touch us gently, gentle Time !
LOVE ME IF I LIVE.
Love me if Hive! y
Love me if I die!
What to me is life or death,
So that thou be nigh ?
Once I loved thee rich.
Now I love thee poor;
Ah ! what is there I could not
For thy sake endure ?
Kiss me for my love!
Pay me for my pain !
Come ! and murmur in my ear
How thou lov'st again!
THE SEA.
The sea! the sea! the open sea!
The blue, the fresh, the ever free!
Without a mark, Avithout a bound,
It runneth the earth's wide regions
round !
It plays with the clouds ; it mocks the
skies;
Or like a cradled creature lies.
I'm on the sea! I'm on the sea!
I am where I would ever be ;
With the blue above, and the blue
below.
And silence wheresoe'er I go;
PROCTER.
445
If a storm should come and awake
the deep,
What matter '^ I shall ride and sleep.
I love, oh, lioio 1 love to ride
On the tierce, foaming, bursting tide,
When every mad wave drowns the
moon.
Or whistles aloft his tempest tune,
And tells how goeth the world Ijelow,
And why the sou' west blasts do blow.
I never was on the dull, tame shore.
But I loved the great sea more and
more.
And backward flew to her billowy
breast, [nest;
Like a bird that seeketh its mother's
And a mother she was, and is, to me;
For I was born on the open sea !
The waves were white, and red the
morn.
In the noisy hour when I was born ;
And the wliale it whistled, the por-
poise rolled,
And the dolphins bared their backs
of gold; [wild
And never was heard such an outcry
As welcomed to life the ocean child!
I've lived since then, in calm and
strife.
Full fifty summers, a sailor's life,
With wealth to spend and a power to
range,
But never have sought nor sighed for
change ;
And Death, whenever he comes to me.
Shall come on the wild, unbounded
sea!
HISTORY OF A LIFE.
Day dawned: — within a curtained
room.
Filled to faintness with perfume,
A lady lay at point of doom.
Day closed; — a child had seen the
light;
But, for the lady fair and bright,
She rested in undreamintr night.
Spring rose; the lady's grave was
green ;
And near it, oftentimes, was seen
A gentle boy with thoughtfid mien.
Years fled ; — he wore a manly face,
And struggled in the world's rough
race.
And won at last a lofty place.
And then he died ! Behold before ye
Humanity's poor sum and story;
Life, — Death, — and all that is of
glory.
A PRAYER IN SICKNESS.
Send down Thy winged angel, God !
Amid this night so wild;
And bid him come where now we
watch.
And breathe upon our child !
She lies upon her pillow, pale,
And moans within her sleep.
Or wakeneth with a patient smile,
And striveth not to weep.
How gentle and how good a child
She is. we know too well.
And dearer to her parents' hearts
Than our weak words can tell.
We love — we watch throughout the
night,
To aid, when need may be;
We hope — and have despaired, at
times;
But now we turn to Thee !
Send down Thy sweet-souled angel,
God!
Amid the darkness wild ;
And bid him soothe our souls to-night.
And heal our gentle child !
THE POET'S SONG TO HIS WIFE.
How^ many summers, love,
Have I been thine ?
How many days, thou dove,
Hast thou been mine ?
446
PROCTOR.
Time, like the winged wind
Wlien 't bends the flowers,
Hath left no mark behind,
To covmt the hours I
Some weight of thought, though loath,
On thee he leaves;
Some lines of care round both
Perhaps he weaves ;
Some fears, — a soft regret
For joys scarce known ;
Sweet looks we half forget; —
All else is flown !
All! — With what thankless heart
I mourn and sing!
Look, where our children start,
Like sudden spring!
With tongues all sweet and low
Like pleasant rhyme.
They tell how much 1 owe
'i'o thee and time!
SOFTLY WOO AWAY HER BREATH.
Softly woo away her breath.
Gentle death!
Let her leave thee with no strife,
Tender, mournful, murmuring life!
She hath seen her happy day, —
She hath had her bud and blos-
som;
Now she pales and shrinks away.
Earth, into thy gentle bosom I
She hath done her bidding here.
Angels dear !
Bear her jjerfect soul above.
Seraph of the skies. — sweet
love !
Good she was, and fair in youth:
And her mind was seen to soar,
And lier heart was wed to truth :
Take her, then, forevermore. —
Forever — evermore. —
/ DIE FOB THY SWEET LOVE.
I DIE for thy sweet love ! The ground
Not panteth so for summer rain.
As 1 for one soft look of thine ;
And yet, — I sigh in vain !
A hundred men are near 'thee now :
Each one, perhaps, surpassing
me;
But who doth feel a thousandth part
Of what I feel for thee ?
They look on thee, as men will look,
AVho round the wild world laugh
and rove;
/ only think how sweet 'twould be
To die for thy sweet love !
Edna Dean Proctor.
BUT HE A VEX, O LORD, I CAN-
NOT LOSE.
Now summer finds her perfect prime !
Sweet blows the wind from west-
ern calms ;
On every bower red roses climb;
The meadows sleep in mingled
balms.
Nor stream, nor bank the wayside by,
But lilies float and daisies throng.
Nor space of blue and sunny sky
That is not cleft with soaring song.
O flowery morns, O tuneful eves.
Fly swift! my soul ye cannot fill!
Bring the ripe fruit, the garnered
sheaves.
The drifting snows on plain and
hill.
Alike to me, fall frosts and dews;
But Heaven, O Lord. I cannot lose !
Warm hands to-day are clasped in
mine :
Fond hearts my mirth or mourning
share :
And, over lioi)e's horizon line.
The futnre dawns, serenely fair;
Yet still, though fervent vow denies,
I know the rapture will not stay;
Some wind of grief or doubt will
rise
And turn ray rosy sky to gray.
I shall awake, in rainy morn.
To find my heart left lone and
drear ;
Thus, half in sadness, half in scorn.
I let my life burn on as clear
Though friends grow cold or fond
love woos ;
But Heaven, O Lord, I cannot lose!
In golden hours, the angel Peace
Comes down ami broods me with
her wings:
I gain from sorrow sweet release;
I mate me with divinest things;
When shapes of guilt and gloom
arise
And far the radiant angel flees, —
My song is lost in mournful sighs.
My wine of triumph left but lees.
In vain for me her pinions shine.
And pure, celestial days begin:
Earth's passion-flowers 1 still must
twine.
Nor braid one beauteous lily in.
Ah! is it good or ill I choose ?
But Heaven, O Lord, I cannot lose!
So wait I. Every day that dies
With flush and fragrance born of
June,
I know shall more resplendent rise
Where sunnner needs nor sun nor
moon.
And every bud on love's low tree.
Whose mocking crimson flames and
falls.
In fullest flower I yet shall see
High blooming by the jasper walls.
Xay, every sin that dims my days.
And wild regrets that veil the
sun.
Shall fade before those dazzling
rays.
And my long glory be begun !
Let the years come to bless or bruise ;
Thy heaven, O Lord, I shall not
lose!
CONTOOCOOK RIVER.
Of all the streams that seek the sea
By momitain pass, or sunny lea,
Now where is one that dares to vie
With clear Contoocook, swift and
shy?
Monadnock's child, of snow-drifts
born,
The snows of many a winter morn.
And many a midnight dark and still.
Heaped higher, whiter, day by day,
To melt, at last, with suns of May,
And steal in tiny fall and rill,
Down the long slopes of granite gray :
Or, filter slow through seam and cleft,
When frost and storm the rock have
reft,
To bubble cool in sheltered springs
Wliei'e the lone red-bird dips his
Avings,
And the tired fox that gains its brink
Stoops, safe from hound and horn, to
drink.
Aud rills and springs, grown broad
and deep.
Unite through gorge and glen to
sweep
In roaring brooks that turn and take
The over-floods of pool and lake.
Till, to the fields, the hills deliver
Contoocook' s bright and brimming
river !
O have you seen, from Hillsboro'
town
How fast its tide goes hurrying down.
With rapids now, and now a leap
Past giant boulders, black and steep.
Plunged in mid water, fain to keep
Its current from the meadows green ?
But, flecked with foam, it speeds
along ;
And not the birch trees' silvery sheen.
Nor the soft lull of whispering pines.
Nor hermit thrushes, fluting low.
Nor ferns, nor cardinal flowers that
glow
Where clematis, the fairy, twines.
Can stay its course, or still its song;
Ceaseless it flows till, round its bed,
The vales of Ilenniker are spread.
Their banks all set with golden grain.
Or stately trees whose vistas gleam —
A double forest in the stream;
448
PROCTOR.
And, winding 'neath the pine-
crowned hill
That overhangs the village plain.
By sunny reaches, broad and still,
It nears the bridge that spans its
tide —
The bridge whose arches low and wide
It ripples through — and should you
lean
A moment there, no lovelier scene
On England's Wye, or Scotland's Tay,
Would charm your gaze a summer's
day.
And on it glides, by grove and glen.
Dark woodlands ami the homes of
men.
With now a ferry, now a mill:
Till, deep and calm, its waters fill
The channels round that gem of isles
Sacred to captives' woes and wiles.
And. gleeful half, half eddying back.
Blend with the lordly Merrimac:
And Merrimac whose tide is strong
Rolls gently, with its waves along,
Monadnock's stream that, coy and
fair,
Mas come, its larger life to share.
And, to the sea, doth safe deliver
Contoocook's bright and brimming
river!
DAILY DYING.
Not in a moment drops the rose
That in a summer garden grows:
A robin sings beneath the tree
A twilight song of ecstasy.
And the red, red leaves at its fragrant
heart,
Trembling so in delicious pain.
Fall to the ground with a sudden
start,
And the grass is gay with a crim-
son stain ;
And a honey-bee, out of the fields
of clover.
Heavily flying the garden over.
Brushes the stem as it passes by,
And others fall where the heart-
leaves lie,
And air and dew, ere the night is
done.
Have stolen the petals, every one.
And sunset's gleam of gorgeous dyes
Ne"er with one shadow fades away,
But slowly o'er those radiant skies
There steals the evening cold and
gray,
And amber and violet linger still
When stars are over the eastern hill.
The maple does not shed its leaves
In one tempestuous scarlet rain.
But softly, when the south wind
grieves,
Slow-wandering over wood and
plain,
One by one they waver through
The Indian Summer's hazy blue.
And drop, at last, on the forest
mould.
Coral and ruby and burning gold.
Our death is gradual, like to these:
AVe die with every waning day ;
There is no waft of sorrow's breeze
But bears some heart-leaf slow
away !
Up and on to the vast To Be
Our life is going eternally!
Less of earth than we had last year
Throbs in your veins and throbs in
mine.
But the way to heaven is growing
clear,
While the gates of the city fairer
shine.
And the day that our latest treas-
ures flee,
Wide they will open for you and
me!
HEROES.
The winds that once the Argo bore
Have died by Neptune's ruined
shrines.
And her hull is the drift of the deep
sea-floor.
Though shaped of Pelion's tallest
pines.
You may seek her crew on every isle
Fair in the foam of ^Egean seas.
But, out of their rest, no charm can
wile
Jason and Orpheus and Hercules.
PROCTOR.
449
And Priam's wail is heard no more
By windy Uion's sea-built walls;
Nor great Achilles, stained with gore,
Shonts, "O ye Gods! 'tis Hector
falls!"
On Ida's mount is the shining snow.
But Jove has gone from its brow
away ;
And red on the plain the poppies
grow
Where the Greek and the Trojan
fought that day.
Mother Earth! Are the hei'oes
dead ?
Do they thrill the soul of the years
no more ?
Are the gleaming snows and the pop-
pies red [yore ?
All that is left of the brave of
Are there none to fight as Theseus
fought ?
Far in the yoimg world's misty
dawn ?
Or to teach as the gray-haired Nestor
taught ■?
Mother Earth! are the heroes
gone '?
Gone ? In a grander form they rise ;
Dead ? We may clasp their hands
in ours ; [eyes.
And catch the light of their clearer
And wreathe their brows with im-
mortal flowers.
Wherever a noble deed is done
'T is the pulse of a hero's heart is
stirred ;
Wherever Right has a triumph won
There are the heroes' voices heard.
Their armor rings on a fairer field
Than the Greek and the Trojan
fiercely trod ;
For Freedom's sword is the blade
they wield.
And the light above is the smile of
of God.
So. in his isle of calm delight,
Jason may sleep the years away;
For the heroes live and the sky is
bright.
And the world is a braver world
to-day.
TO MOSCOW.
Across the steppe we journeyed,
The brown, fir-darkened plain
That rolls to east and rolls to west,
Broad as the billowy main,
When lo! a sudden splendor
Came shimmering through the air,
As if the clouds should melt and leave
The heights of heaven bare, —
A maze of rainbow domes and spires
Full glorious on the sky.
With wafted chimes from many a
tower
As the south-wind went by.
And a thousand crosses lightly hung
That shone like morning stars, —
'Twas the Kremlin wall! 'Twas Mos-
cow, —
The jewel of the Czars !
SUNSET IX MO SCO IF.
O THE splendor of the city.
When the sun is in the west!
Ruddy gold on spire and belfry,
Gold on Moskwa's placid breast;
Till the twilight soft and sombre
Falls on wall and street and square,
And the domes and towers in shadow
Stand like silent monks at prayer.
'Tis the hour for dream and legend:
Meet me by the Sacred Gate !
We will watch the crowd go by us;
We will stories old relate;
Till the bugle of the barracks
Calls the soldier to repose.
And from off the steppe to northward
Chill the wind of midnight blows.
450
QUARLES.
Francis Quarles.
THE WORLD.
She's empty: hark! she sounds: there's nothing there
But noise to fill thy ear;
Thy vain inquiry can at length but find
A blast of murmin-ing wind :
It is a cask that seems as full as fair.
But merely tunned with air.
Fond youth, go build thy hopes on better grounds;
The soul that vainly founds
Her joys upon this world, but feeds on empty sounds.
She's empty: hark! she sounds; there's nothing in't:
The spark-engendering flint
Shall sooner melt, and hardest raunce shall first
Dissolve and quench thy thirst,
Ere this false world shall still thy stormy breast
With smooth-faced calms of rest.
Thou mayst as well expect meridian light
From shades of black-mouthed night,
As in this empty world to find a full delight.
She's empty: hark! she sounds: 'tis void and vast;
What if some flattering blast
Of fatiTous honor should perchance be there.
And whisper in thine ear ?
It is but wind, and blows but where it list,
And vanisheth like mist.
Poor honor earth can give ! What generous mind
Would be so base to bind
Her heaven-bred soul, a slave to serve a blast of wind ?
She's empty; hark! she sounds: 'tis but a ball
For fools to play withal ;
The painted film but of a stronger bubble,
That's lined with silken trouble.
It is a world whose work and recreation
Is vanity and vexation ;
A hag, repaired with vice-complexioned paint,
A quest-house of complaint.
It is a saint, a fiend ; worse fiend when most a saint.
She's empty: hark! she sounds: 'tis vain and void.
AVhat's here to be enjoyed
But grief and sickness, and large bills of sorrow.
Drawn now and crossed to-morrow ?
Or, what are men but puffs of dying breath,
Kevived with living death ?
Fond youth, O Inuld thy hopes on surer grounds
Than what dull flesh propovmds:
Trust not this hollow world; she's empty: hark! she sounds.
ox MAK.
At our creation, but the Worrl was
said ;
And M'e were made ;
No sooner were, but our false hearts
did swell
With pride, and fell :
How slight is man ! At what an easy
cost
He's made and lost I
GRIEF FOR THE LOSS OF THE
DEAD.
I MUST lament, Nature commands it
so:
The more I strive with tears, the
more they How;
These eyes have just, nay, double
cause of moan ;
They weep the common loss, they
weep their own.
He sleeps indeed; then give me leave
to weep
Tears, fully answerable to his sleep.
How, how am I deceived I I thought
my bed
Had entertained a fair, a beauteous
bride :
Oh, how were my believing thoughts
misled
To a false beauty lying by my side!
Sweet were her kisses, full of choice
delight; [night:
My fancy found no difference in the
I thought they were true joys that
thus had led
My darkened soul, but they were
false alarms ;
I thought I'd had fair Rachel in my
bed.
But I had blear-eyed Leah in my
arnas :
How seeming sweet is sin when
clothed in light.
But, when discovered, what a
loathed delight.
OxV THE LIFE OF MAX.
Our life is nothing but a winter's
day;
Some only break their fasts, and so,
away :
Others stay dinner, and depart full
fed;
The deepest age but sups and goes to
bed:
He's most in debt that lingers out
the day ;
Who dies betimes, has less ; and less
to pay.
OX DOVES AXD SERPEXTS.
We must have doves and serpents in
our heart;
But how they must be marshalled,
there's the art.
They must agree, and not l)e far
asunder ;
The dove must hold the wily serpent
under;
Their natures teach what places they
must keep.
The dove can fly; the sei-pent only
creep.
452
BALEIGH.
Sir Walter Raleigh.
Go, soul, the body's guest,
Upon a thankless errand;
Fear not to touch the best;
The truth shall be thy warrant.
Go, since I needs must die,
And give them all the lie.
Go, tell the court it glows,
And shines like painted wood ;
Go, tell the church it shows
What's good, but does no good.
If court and church reply.
Give court and church the lie.
Tell potentates, they live
Acting, but oh I their actions
Not loved, unless they give;
Not strong, but by their factions.
If potentates reply,
Give potentates the lie.
Tell men of liigli condition,
That nde affairs of state,
Their purpose is ambition ;
Tlieir practice only hate.
Anil if they do reply,
Then give them all the lie.
Tell those that brave it most.
They beg for more by spending.
Who, in their greatest cost.
Seek nothing but commending.
And if they make reply,
Spare not to give the lie.
Tell zeal it lacks devotion ;
Tell love it is but lust;
Tell time it is but motion;
Tell tlesh it is but dust:
And wish them not reply,
For thou must give the lie.
Tell age it daily wasteth ;
Tell honor how it alters;
Tell beauty that it blasteth;
Tell favor that she falters ;
And as they do reply,
Give every one the lie.
Tell wit how much it wrangles
In fickle points of niceness ;
Tell wisdom she entangles
Herself in over-wiseness:
And if they do reply.
Then give them both the lie.
Tell physic of her boldness;
Tell skill it is pretension;
Tell charity of coldness ;
Tell law it is contention:
And if they yield reply.
Then give them still the lie,
Tell fortune of her blindness ;
Tell nature of decay ;
Tell friendship of unkindness;
Tell justice of delay:
And if they do reply.
Then give them all the lie.
Tell arts they have not soundness,
But vary by esteeming:
Tell schools they lack profoundness,
And stand too much on seeming.
If arts and schools reply.
Give arts and schools the lie.
Tell faith it's fled the city;
Tell how the country erreth;
Tell manhood shakes off pity ;
Tell virtue, least preferreth.
And if they do reply,
Spare not to give the lie.
So, when thou hast, as I
Commanded thee, done blabbing,
Although to give the lie,
Deserves no less than stabbing;
Yet stab at thee who will,
No stab the soul can kill.
THE SILENT LOrEli.
Passions are likened best to floods
and streams.
The shallow murmur, but the deep
are dumb ;
BEAD.
453
So, when affection yields discourse,
it seems
Tlie bottom is but shallow whence
they come ;
They that are rich in words, must
needs discover
Tliey are but poor in that which
maltes a lover.
Wrong not, sweet mistress of my
heart,
The merit of true passion ;
"With thinking that he feels no smart
That sues for no compassion.
Since, if my plaints were not to ap-
prove
The conquest of thy beauty,
It comes not from defect of love,
Bat fear to exceed my duty.
For knowing not I sue to serve
A saint of such perfection
As all desire, but none deserve
A place in her affection,
I rather choose to want relief
Than venture the revealing;
Where glory recommends the grief.
Despair disdains the healing.
Silence in love betrays more woe
Than words, though ne'er so witty;
A beggar that is dumb, you know,
May challenge double pity.
Then WTong not, dearest to my heart,
My love for secret passion ;
He smarteth most who hides his
smart
And sues for no compassion.
Thomas Buchanan Read.
SHERIDAN'S RIDE.
Up from the south at break of day,
Bringing to Winchester fresh dismay,
The aifrighted air with a shudder
bore,
Like a herald in haste, to the chief-
tain's door.
The terrible grumble and rumble and
roar.
Telling the battle was on once more.
And Sheridan twenty miles away.
And wider still those billows of war
Thundered along the horizon's bar;
And louder yet into Winchester
rolled
The roar of that red sea uncontrolled.
Making the blood of the listener cold
As he thought of the stake in that
fiery fray,
Witli Sheridan twenty miles away.
But there is a road from Winchester
town,
A good, broad highway, leading
down ;
And there, through the flash of the
morning light,
A steed as black as the steeds of night
Was seen to pass as with eagle flight.
As if he knew the terrible need.
He stretched away with the utmost
speed ;
Hills rose and fell, — but his heart
was gay.
With Sheridan fifteen miles away.
Still sprung from those swift hoofs,
tlunidering south
The dust, like smoke from the can-
non's mouth;
Or the trail of a comet , sweeping
faster and faster, [disaster.
Foreboding to traitors the doom of
The heart of the steed and the heart
of the master
Were beating, like prisoners assault-
ing their walls, [calls;
Impatient to be where the battle-field
Every nerve of the charger was
strained to full play,
Witli Sheridan only ten miles away.
Under his spurning feet, tlie road
Like an arrowy Alpine river flowed,
And tlie landscape sped away behind,
Like an ocean flying before the wind ;
And the steed, like a bark fed with
furnace ire.
Swept on, with his wild eyes full of
fire;
But, lo! he is nearing his heart's
desire.
He is snuffing the smoke of the roar-
ing fray.
With Sheridan only five miles away :
The first that the General saw were
the groups
Of stragglers, and then the retreating
troops ;
What was done, — what to do, — a
glance told him both,
And, striking his spurs with a terri-
ble oath.
He dashed down the line mid a storm
of huzzas.
And the wave of retreat checked its
course tliere, because
The sight of the master compelled it
to pause.
With foam and with dust the black
charger was gray ;
By the flash of his eye, and his nos-
trils' play.
He seemed to the whole great army to
say,
" I have brought you Sheridan all the
way
From Winchester down, to save the
day!"
Hurrah, hurrah for Sheridan!
Hurrah, hurrah for horse and man !
And when their statues are placed on
high.
Under the dome of the Union sky. —
The American soldier's Temple of
Fame, —
There with the glorious General's
name
Be it said in letters both bold and
bright :
" Here is the steed that saved the day
By carrying Sheridan into the fight.
From Winchester, — twenty miles
away! "
THE CLOSING SCENE.
Within the sober realm of leafless
trees,
The russet year inhaled the dreamy
air;
Like some tanned reaper, in liis hour
of ease.
When all the fields are lying brown
and bare.
The gray barns looking from their
hazy hills.
O'er the dmi waters widening in
the vales,
Sent down the air a greeting to the
mills
On the dull thunder of alternate
flails.
All sights were mellowed and all
sounds subdued.
The hills seemed further and the
stream sang low.
As in a dream the distant woodman
hewed
His winter log with many a muffled
blow.
The embattled forests, erewhile armed
with gold.
Their banners bright with every
martial hue,
Now stood like some sad, beaten host
of old,
Withdrawn afar in Time's remotest
blue.
On slumb'rous wings the vulture held
his flight ;
The dove scarce heard its sighing
mate's complaint;
And, like a star slow drowning in the
light.
The village church-vane seemed to
pale and faint.
The sentinel-cock upon the hillside
crew, —
Crew thrice. — and all was stiller
than before ;
Silent, till some replying warden blew
His alien horn, and then was heard
no more.
READ.
455
Where erst the jay, within the elm's
tall crest,
Made garrulous trouble round her
unriedged young ;
And where the oriole hung her sway-
ing nest,
By every light wind like a censer
SAVung ; —
Where sang the noisy martens of the
eaves.
The busy swallows circling ever
near, —
Foreboding, as the rustic mind be-
lieves.
An early harvest and a plenteous
year; —
Wliere every bird which charmed the
vernal feast
IShook the sweet skimber from its
wings at morn,
To warn the reaper of the i-osy east : —
All now was sunless, empty, and
forlorn.
Alone from out the stubble piped the
quail,
And croaked the crow through all
the dreamy gloom ;
Alone the pheasant, drumming in the
vale.
Made echo to the distant cottage
loom.
There was no bud, no bloom upon
the bowers;
The spiders moved their thin
shrouds night by night.
The thistle-down, the only ghost of
flowers,
Sailed slowly by, — passed noiseless
out of sight.
Amid all this — in this most cheerless
air,
And where the woodbine shed upon
the porch
Its crimson leaves, as if the year
stood there
Firing the floor with his inverted
torch, —
Amid all this, the centre of the
scene.
The white-haired matron with mo-
notonous tread
Plied the swift wheel, and with her
joyless mien
Sat, like a fate, and watched the
flying thread.
She had known Sorrow, — he had
walked with her.
Oft supped, and broke the bitter
ashen crust;
And in the dead leaves still she heard
the stir
Of his black mantle trailing in the
dust.
While yet her cheek was bright with
summer bloom.
Her country summoned and she
gave her all ;
And twice War bowed to her his
sable plume, —
Re-gave the swords to rust upon
the wall.
Re-gave the swords, but not the hand
that drew
And struck for Liberty the dying
blow ;
Nor him who, to his sire and country
true.
Fell mid the ranks of the invading
foe.
Long, but not loud, the droning wheel
went on,
Like the low murmm- of a hive
at noon ;
Long, but not loud, the memory of
the gone
Breathed through her lips a sad and
tremulous tmie.
At last the thread was snapped ; her
head was bowed ;
Life dropt the distaff through his
hands serene:
And loving neighbors smoothed her
careful shroud.
While Death and Winter closed the
autumn scene.
456
BEAD.
THE BRAVE AT HOME.
The maid who binds her warrior's
sash
With smile that well her pain dis-
sembles,
The while beneath her drooping lash
One stari-y tear-drop hangs and
trembles, [tear,
Though Heaven alone records the
And Fame shall never know her
story,
Her heart has shed a drop as dear
As e'er bedewed the field of glory!
The wife who girds her husband's
sword,
Mid little ones who weep or wonder,
And bravely speaks the cheering
word.
What though her heart be rent
asmider.
Doomed nightly in her dreams to hear
The bolts of death around him
rattle.
Hath shed as sacred blood as e'er*
Was poured upon the field of battle !
The mother who conceals her grief
While to her breast her son she
presses,
Then breathes a few brave words and
brief,
Kissing the patriot brow she blesses.
With no one but her secret God
To know the pain that weighs
upon her,
Sheds holy blood as e' er the sod
Received on Freedom's field of
honor !
DIUFTIXG.
My soul to-day
Is far away.
Sailing the Vesuvian Bay;
My winged boat,
A bii'd afloat.
Swims round the purple peaks re-
mote : —
Round purijle peaks
It sails, and seeks
Blue inlets and their crystal creeks,
Where high rocks throw,
Through deeps below,
A duplicated golden glow.
Far, vague, and dim
The mountains swim;
While, on Vesuvius' misty brim,
With outstretched hands,
The gray smoke stands
O'erlooking the volcanic lands.
Here Ischia smiles
O'er liquid miles;
And yonder, bluest of the isles,
Calm Cajiri waits.
Her sapphire gates
Beguiling to her bright estates.
I heed not, if
My rippling skiff
Float swift or slow from cliff to cliff ; —
With dreamful eyes
My spirit lies
Under the walls of Paradise.
Under the walls
Where swells and falls
The bay's deep breast at intervals,
At peace I lie.
Blown softly by,
A cloud upon this liquid sky.
The day, so mild,
Is Heaven's own child.
With Earth and Ocean reconciled ; —
The airs I feel
Around me steal
Are murmuring to the murmuring
keel.
Over the rail
My hand I trail
Within the shadow of the sail ;
A joy intense.
The cooling sense
Glides down my drowsy indolence.
With dreamful eyes
My spirit lies
Where Summer sings and never
dies, —
O'erveiled with vines,
She glows and shines
Among her future oil and wines.
Her children, hid
The cliffs amid.
Are gambolling with the gambolling
kid;
Or down the walls,
With tipsy calls,
Laugh on the rocks like waterfalls.
The fisher's child.
With tresses wild,
Unto the smooth, bright sand be-
guiled.
With glowing lips
Sings as she skips.
Or gazes at the far-off ships.
Yon deep bark goes
Where traffic blows.
From lands of sun to lands of snows ; —
This happier one.
Its course is run
From lands of snow to lands of sun.
O happy ship,
To rise and dip.
With the blue crystal at your lip !
O happy crew,
My heart with you
Sails, and sails, and sings anew !
No more, no more
The worldly shore
Upbraids me with its loud uproar!
With dreamful eyes
My spirit lies
Under the walls of Paradise !
In lofty lines.
Mid palms and pines.
And olives, aloes, elms, and vines,
Sorrento swings
On sunset wings,
Where Tasso's spirit soars and
sings.
Richard Realf.
MY SLAIN.
This sweet child that hath climbed
upon my knee.
This amber-haired, fom'-summered
little maid.
With her imconscious beauty troub-
leth me.
With her low prattle maketh me
afraid.
Ah, darling! when you cling and
nestle so
You hurt me, though you do not
see me cry,
Nor hear the weariness with which
I sigh
For the dear babe I killed so long
ago.
I tremble at the touch of your
caress :
I am not worthy of your innocent
faith;
I, who with whetted knives of
worldliness.
Did put my own child-hearteduess to
death ;
Beside whose grave I pace forever-
more,
Like desolation on a shipwrecked
shore.
There is no little child within me now,
To sing back to the thrushes, to
leap up
When June winds kiss me, when an
apple-bough
Laughs into blossoms, or a butter-
cup
Plays with the sunshine, or a violet
Dances in the glad dew. Alas!
alas!
The meaning of the daisies in the
grass
I have forgotten; and if my cheeks
are wet.
It is not wath the blitheness of the
child.
But with the bitter sorrow of sad
years.
O moaning life ! with life irrecou-
ciled ;
458
RICHARDSON.
O backward-looking thought I O pain I
O tears !
For us tliere is not any silver sound
Of rhythmic wontlers springing from
the ground.
Woe worth the knowledge and the
bookish lore
AVhich makes men mummies;
weighs out every grain
Of that which was miraculous before,
And sneers the heart down with
the scotring brain ;
AVoe worth the peering, analytic
days
That dry the tender juices in the
breast,
And put the thunders of the Lord
to test, [praise,
So that no marvel must be, and no
Nor any God except Necessity.
"What can ye give my poor stained
life in lieu
Of this dead cherub which I slew
for ye !
Take back your doubtful wisdom and
renew [dunce,
My early foolish freshness of the
AVhose simple instincts guessed the
heavens at once.
Charles F.
AMENDS.
Think not your duty done when, sad
and tearful,
Your heart recounts its sins,
And praying God for pardon, weak
and fearful.
Its better life begins,
Nor rest content when, braver grown
and stronger.
Your days are sweet and pure.
Because you follow evil ways no
longer,
In Christ's defence secure.
Bethink you then, but not with fruit-
less ruing,
— That bids the past be still.
But what yovn- life has wrought to
men's undoing.
By influence for ill.
Go forth, and dare not rest until the
morrow.
But, lest it l)e too late,
Seek out the hearts whose weight of
sin and sorrow
Through you has grown more
great.
Take gifts to all of love and repara-
tion.
Or if it may not be,
Richardson.
Pray Christ, with ceaseless lips, to
send salvation
Till each chained soul be free.
WORSHIP.
Bkaa^e spirit, that will brook no in-
tervention.
But thus alone before thy God dost
stand.
Content if he but see thy heart's in-
tention, —
Why spurn the suppliant knee and
outstretched hand ?
Sweet soul, that kneelest in the sol-
emn gloiy
Of yon cathedral altar, while the
prayer
Of priest or bishop tells thine own
heart's story, —
Why think that they alone heaven's
keys may bear ?
Man worships with the heart; for
wheresoever
One burning pulse of heartfelt hom-
age stirs.
There God shall straightway find his
own, and never
In church or desert, miss his wor-
shippers.
ROBEBTS.
459
PA TIESCE.
If, when you labor all the day,
You see its minutes slip away
With joy unfound, witli work undone,
And hope descending with the sun,
Then cheerily lie down to rest:
The longest work shall be the best;
And when the mori'ow greets your
eyes,
With strong and patient heart arise.
For Patience, stern and leaden-eyed,
Looks far where f utm-e joys abide ;
Nor sees short sadness at her feet.
For sight of triumpli long and sweet.
IMITATIOX.
Where shall we find a perfect life,
whereby
To shape our lives for all eternity '?
This man is great and wise ; the world
reveres him,
Reveres, but cannot love his heart
of stone ;
And so it dares not folIo\\-, though it
fears him.
But bids him walk his mountain
path alone.
That man is good and gentle ; all men
love him,
Yet dare not ask his feeble arm for
aid;
The world's best work is ever far
above him.
He shrinks beneath the storm-
capped mountain shade.
O loveless strength! O strengthless
love! the Master
Whose life shall shape our lives is
not as thou:
Sweet Friend in peace, strong Saviour
in disaster,
Our heart of hearts enfolds thine
image now !
Be Christ's the fair and perfect life
whereby
We shape our lives for all eternity.
JUSTICE.
A HUNDRED noble wishes fill my
heart,
I long to help each soul in need of
aid;
In all good works my zeal would have
its part,
Before no weight of toil it stands
afraid.
But noble wishes are not nol:)le
deeds.
And he does least who seeks to do
the whole;
Who works the best, his simplest
duties heeds,
Who moves the world, first moves
a single soul.
Then go, my heart, thy plainest work
begin,
Do first not what thou canst, but
what thou must ;
Build not upon a corner-stone of sin.
Nor seek great works imtil thou
first be just.
Sarah Roberts.
THE VOICE OF THE GliASS.
Here I come creeping, creeping
everywhere ;
By the dusty roadside,
On the sunny hill-side.
Close by the noisy brook,
In every shady brook,
I come creeping, creeping eveiy-
where.
Here I come creeping, smiling every-
where ;
All around the open door.
460
ROGERS.
Where sit the aged poor;
Here where the children play,
In the hright and merry May,
I come creeping, creeping every-
where.
Here I come creeping, creeping every-
where ;
In the noisy city street,
My pleasant face you'll meet,
Cheering the sick at heart
Toiling his busy part —
Silently creeping, creeping everj^-
where.
Here I come creeping, creeping every-
where ;
You cannot see me coming.
Nor hear my low sweet humming ;
For in the starry night.
And the glad morning light,
I come quietly creeping everywhere.
Here I come creeping, creeping every-
where ;
More welcome than the flowers
In summer's pleasant hours;
The gentle cow is glad,
And the merry bird not sad.
To see me creeping, creeping every-
where.
Here I come creeping, creeping every-
where ;
When you're numbered with the
dead
In your still and narrow bed,
In the happy spring I'll come
And deck your silent home —
Creeping, silently creei)iug every-
where.
Here I come creeping, creeping every-
where ;
My humble song of praise
]Most joyfully I raise
To Him at whose command
I beautify the land.
Creeping, silently creeping every-
where.
Samuel Rogers.
Si.r Poems entitled by the author, '•^Reflections."
THE PEHVEIISION OF GREAT
GIFTS.
Alas, to our discomfort and his own,
Oft are the greatest talents to be found
In a fool's keeping. For what else
is he,
However worldly wise and worldly
strong,
Who can pervert and to the worst
abuse
The noblest means to serve the no-
blest ends ?
Who can employ the gift of elo-
quence.
That sacred gift, to dazzle and de-
lude ;
Or, if achievement in the field be his.
Climb but to gain a loss, suffering
how much.
And how much more inflicting!
Every where,
Cost what they will, such cruel freaks
are played ;
And hence tlie turmoil in this world
of ours,
The turmoil never ending, still be-
ginning,
The wailing and the tears. — When
Ccesar came.
He who could master all men but
himself,
Who did so much and could so well
record it; [part,
Even he, the most applauded in his
Who, when he spoke, all things
summed up in him,
Spoke to convince, nor ever, when
he fought,
Fought but to conquer, — what a life
was his.
Slaying so many, to be slain at last;
A life of trouble and incessant toil,
And all to gain what is far better
missed!
ROGERS.
461
HEART SUPERIOR TO HEAD.
The heart, tlie^' say, is wiser tlian
tlie schools:
And well they may. All that is great
in thouglit,
That strikes at once as with electric
tire,
And lifts us, as it were, from earth
to heaven.
Comes from the heart; and who con-
fesses not
Its voice as sacred, nay, almost di-
vine.
When inly it declares on what we
do.
Blaming, approving ? Let an erring
^\orkl
Judge as it will, we care not while
we stand
Acquitted there; and oft, wiien
clouds on clouds
Compass us round and not a track
appears.
Oft is an upright heart the surest
guide.
Surer and better than the subtlest
head ;
ytill with its silent counsels through
the dark
Onward and onward leading.
ON A CHILD.
This child, so lovely and so cherub-
like,
(No fairer spirit in the heaven of
heavens)
Say, must he know remorse ? Must
passion come.
Passion in all or any of its shapes.
To cloud and sully what is now so
pure ?
Yes, come it must. For who, alas!
has lived,
Nor in the watches of tlie night re-
called
Words he has wished unsaid and
deeds undone ?
Yes, come it nuist. But if, as we
may hope.
He learns ere long to discipline liis
mind,
And onward goes, humbly and cheer-
fully.
Assisting them that faint, weak
though he be,
And in his trying hours trusting in
God,—
Fair as he is, he shall be fairer still ;
For what was innocence will then be
virtue.
MAN'S RESTLESSNESS.
Man to the last is but a froward
child ;
So eager for the future, come what
may,
And to the present so insensible !
Oh, if he could in all things as he
would.
Years would as days, and hours as
moments, be;
He would, so restless is his spirit
here.
Give wings to time, and wish his life
away !
THE SELFISH.
Oil, if the selfish knew how much
they lost.
What would they not endeavor, not
endure,
To imitate, as far as in them lay,
Ilim who liis wisdom and his power
employs
In making others happy !
EXHORTATION TO MARRIAGE.
Hence to the altar and with her
thou lov'st.
With her who longs to strew thy way
with flowers;
Nor lose the blessed privilege to give
Birth to a race immortal as your-
selves.
Which trained by you, shall make a
heaven on earth.
And tread the path that leads from
earth to heaven.
462
ROGERS.
[From Human Li/'e.]
THE PASSAGE FROM BIRTH TO
AGE.
And such is Human Life ; so, glid-
ing on,
It glimmers like a meteor, and is
gone !
Yet is the tale, brief though it be, as
strange,
As full, methinks, of wild and won-
drous change.
As any that the wandering tribes
require,
Stretched in the desert round their
evening fire ;
As any sung of old in hall or bower
To liiinstrel-harps at midnight's
witching hour!
Born in a trance, we wake, ob-
serve, inquire;
And the green earth, the azure sky
admire.
Of elfin-size, — for ever as we rim.
We cast a longer shadow in the sun!
And now a charm, and now a grace
is won!
We grow in stature, and in wisdom
too!
And, as new scenes, new objects rise
to view.
Think nothing done while aught re-
mains to do.
Yet, all forgot, how oft the eyelids
close.
And from the slack hand drops the
gathered rose !
How oft, as dead, on the warm turf
we lie,
While many an emmet comes with
curious eye ;
And on her nest the watchful wren
sits by !
Nor do we speak or move, or hear or
see;
So like what once we were, and once
again shall be !
And say, how soon, where, blithe
as innocent.
The boy at sunrise carolled as he
went.
An aged pilgrim on his staff shall
lean,
Tracing in vain the footsteps o'er the
green ;
The man himself how altered, not
the scene !
Now journeying home with nothing
but the name;
Wayworn and spent, another and
the same !
No eye observes the growth or the
decay.
To-day we look as we did yesterday;
And we shall look to-morrow as to-
day.
[From Human Life.]
TRUE LWIOX.
Then before all they stand, — the
holy vow
And ring of gold, no fond illusions
now.
Bind her as his. Across the thresh-
old led,
And every tear kissed off as soon as
shed.
His house she enters, — there to be a
light
Shining within, when all without is
night ;
A guardian-angel o'er his life presid-
ing,
Doubling his pleasures, and his cares
dividing;
Winning him back, when mingling
in the throng.
From a vain Avorld we love, alas, too
long.
To fireside happiness, and hom-s of
ease
Blest with that charm, the certainty,
to please.
How oft her eyes read his ; her gentle
mind
To all his v^ishes, all his thoughts
inclined ;
Still subject, — ever on the watch to
borrow
Mirth of his mirth, and sorrow of his
sorrow.
The soul of music slumbers in the
shell.
Till waked and kindled by the mas-
ter's spell;
ROGERS.
463
And feeling hearts, — touch them hut
rightly, — pour
A thousand melodies unheard before !
[From Human Life.]
AGE.
Age has now
StamjDed with its signet that ingenu-
ous brow:
And. "mid his old hereditary trees.
Trees he has climbed so oft, he sits
and sees
His children's children playing roiuid
his knees :
Then happiest, youngest, when the
quoit is flung,
AVhen side by side the archers' bows
are strung;
His to prescribe the place, adjudge
the j)rize, [energies
Envying no more the young their
Than tliey an old man when his
words are wise;
His a delight how pm'e . , . with-
out alloy;
Strong in their strength, rejoicing in
their joy I [repay
Xow in their turn assisting, they
The anxious cares of many and many
a day ;
And now by those he loves relieved,
restored,
His very wants and weaknesses afford
A feeling of enjoyment. In his walks,
Leaning on them, how oft he stops
and talks,
While they look up ! Their questions,
their replies.
Fresh as the welling waters, round
him rise,
Gladdening his spirit; and, his theme
the past,
How eloquent he is! His thoughts
flow fast ;
And, while his heart (oh, can the
heart grow old ?
False are the tales that in the world
are told!)
Swells in his voice, he knows not
where to end;
Like one discoursing of an absent
friend.
But there are moments which he
calls his own.
Then, never less alone than when
alone.
Those whom he loved so long and
sees no more.
Loved and still loves, — not dead, —
but gone before.
He gathers romid him; and revives
at will
Scenes in his life, — that breathe en-
chantment still, —
That come not now at dreary inter-
vals, —
But where a light as from the blessed
falls,
A light such guests bring ever, — pure
and holy, —
Lapping the soul in sweetest melan-
choly !
— Ah, then less willing (nor the
choice condemn)
To live with others than to think of
them I
[From The Pleasures of Memory.]
MEMOIi Y.
Thou first, best friend that heaven
assigns below
To soothe and sweeten all the cares
we know ;
Whose glad suggestions still each
vain alarm.
When natm-e fades and life forgets
to chann ;
Thee woidd the Muse invoke! — to
thee belong
The sage's precept and the poet's
song.
What softened views thy magic glass
reveals.
When o'er the landscape time's meek
twilight steals !
As when in ocean sinks the orb of
day.
Long on the wave reflected lustres
play;
Thy tempered gleams of happiness
resigned
Glance on the darkened mirror of
the mind.
464
BOSSETTI.
Hail, memory, hail ! in thy exhaust-
less mine
From age to age unnumbered treas-
ures shine !
Thought and her shadowy brood thy
call obey.
And place and time are subject to
thy sway !
Thy pleasures most we feel, when
most alone;
The only pleasures we can call our
own.
Lighter than air, hope's summer
visions die.
If but a fleeting cloud obscure the
sky;
If but a beam of sober reason play,
Lo, fancy's fairy frost-work melts
away!
But can the wiles of art, the grasp of
power
Snatch the rich relics of a well-spent
hour ?
These, when the trembling spirit
wings her flight,
Pour round her path a stream of liv-
ing light;
And gild those pure and perfect
realms of rest.
Where virtue triumphs, and her sons
are blest!
[From The Pleasures of Memory.]
THE OLD SCHOOL-HOUSE.
The school's lone porch, with rev-
erend mosses gray.
Just tells the pensive pilgrim where
it lay.
Mute is the bell that rung at peep of
dawn.
Quickening my truant feet across the
lawn ;
Unheard the shout that rent the
noon-tide air,
When the slow dial gave a pause to
care.
Up springs, at every step, to claim a
tear,
Some little friendship formed and
cherished here;
And not the lightest leaf, but trem-
bling teems
With golden visions and romantic
dreams !
[From The Pleasures of Memory.]
GUARDIAN SPIRITS.
Oft may the spirits of the dead
descend
To watch the silent slumbers of a
friend ;
To hover round his evening walk
unseen.
And hold sweet converse on the dusky
green ;
To hail the spot where first their
friendship grew,
And heaven and nature opened to
their view !
Oft, when he trims his cheerful
hearth, and sees
A smiling circle emulous to please ;
There may these gentle guests de-
light to dwell,
And bless the scene they loved in
life so well!
Christina Georgina PxOssetti.
UP-HILL.
Does the road wind up-hill all the
way ?
Yes, to the very end.
Will the day's journey take the whole
long day ?
From morn to night, my friend.
But is there, for the night a resting-
place ?
A roof for when the slow dark
hoiu-s begin.
May not the darkness hide it from my
fac-e ?
You cannot miss that inn.
BOSSETTI.
465
Shall I meet other wayfarers at night ?
Those who have gone hefore.
Then must I knock, or call when just
in sight ?
They will not keep you standing at
the door.
Shall I find comfort, travel-sore and
weak ?
Of labor you shall find the sum.
Will there be beds for me and all
who seek ?
Yea, beds for all who come.
liEMEMBER.
Kemembei: me when I am gone
away,
Gone far away into the silent land ;
When you can no more hold me by
the hand,
Xor I half turn to go, yet turning stay.
Remember me when no more day by
day
You tell me of our future that you
planned ;
Only remember me; you imdcr-
stand (pi'Ay-
It will be late to counsel then or
Yet if you should forget me for a
while
And afterwards remember, do not
grieve: [leave
P'or if the darkness and corruption
A vestige of the thoughts that once
I had.
Better by far you should forget and
smile
Than that you should remember
and be sad.
THE FIRST SPIilXG DA V.
I WONDER if the sap is stirring yet.
If wintry birds are dreaming of a
mate,
If frozen snowdro^os feel as yet the
Sim
And crocus fires are kindling one by
one;
Sing, robin, sing;
I still am sore in doubt concerning
spring.
I wonder if the springtide of this
year
Will bring another spring both lost
and dear;
If heart and si^irit will find out their
spring.
Or if the world alone will bud and
sing :
Sing, hope, to me ;
Sweet notes, my hope, soft notes for
memory.
The sap will surely quicken soon or
late.
The tardiest bird will twitter to a
mate ;
So spring must dawn again with
warmth and bloom,
Or in this world, or in the world to
come :
Sing, voice of spring,
Till I too blossom, and rejoice and
sinsr.
SONG.
Whex I am dead, my dearest,
Sing no sad songs for me ;
Plant thou no roses at my head,
iSTor shady cypress tree :
Be the green grass above me
With showers and dewdrops wet;
And if thou wilt, remember.
And if thou wilt, forget.
I shall not see the shadows,
I shall not feel the rain ;
I shall not hear the nightingale
Sing on, as if in pain:
And dreaming through the twilight
That doth not rise nor set.
Haply I may remember.
And haply may forget.
SOUND SLEEP.
SoJiE are laughing, some are weep-
ing;
She is sleeping, only sleeping.
Round her rest wild flowers are
creeping ;
^}
466
EOSSETTL
There the wind is heaping, heaping,
Sweetest sweets of summer's keeping,
By the cornfields ripe for reaping.
There are liUes, and there bhishes
The deep rose, and there the thrushes
Sing till latest sunlight flushes
In the west; a fresh wind brushes
Through the leaves while evening
hushes.
There by day the lark is singing
And the grass and weeds are spring-
ing;
There by night the bat is winging;
Tliere for ever Avinds are bringing
Far-off chimes of church-bells ringing.
Night and morning, noon and even.
Their sound fills her dreams witli
Heaven :
The long strife at length is striven:
Till her grave-bands shall be riven,
Such is the good portion given
To her soul at rest and shriven.
WIFE TO HUSBAND.
Pakdon the faults in me,
For the love of years ago :
Good-bye.
I must drift across the sea,
I must sink into the snow,
1 must die.
You can bask in this sun,
You can drink wine, and eat:
Good-bye.
I must gird myself and run.
Though witii unready feet:
I must die.
Blank sea to sail upon,
Cold bed to sleep in:
Good-bye.
Whil(> you clasp I must be gone
For all your weeping:
I must die.
A kiss for one friend.
And a word for two, —
Good-bye : —
A lock that you must send,
A kindness you must do :
I must die.
Not a word for you.
Not a lock or kiss,
Good-bye.
We, one, must part in two;
Yerily death is this :
I must die.
AT HOME.
WiiEi^ I was dead, my spirit turned
To seek the much-frequented
house ;
I passed the door, and saw my friends
Feasting beneath green orange
boughs ;
From hand to hand they pushed the
wine.
They sucked the pulp of plum and
peach ;
They sang, they jested, and they
lauglied.
For eacii was loved of each.
I listened to their honest chat :
Said one: " To-morrow we shall be
Plod plod along the featureless sands,
And coasting miles and miles of
sea."
Said one: "Before the turn of tide
We will acliieve the eyrie-seat."
Said one: '* To-morrow shall be like
To-day, but much more sweet."
" To-morrow," said they, strong with
hope,
And dwelt upon tlie pleasant way:
" To-morrow," cried they one and all.
While no one spoke of yesterday.
Their life stood full at blessed noon;
I, only I, had passed away :
" To-morrow and to-day " they cried :
I was of yesterday.
I shivered comfortless, but cast
No chill across the tablecloth;
I all-forgotten shivered, sad
To stay, and yet to part how loth:
I passed from the familiar room,
I who from love had passed away.
Like the remembrance of a guest
That tarrieth but a day.
M
ROSSETTL
467
Dante Gabriel Rossetti.
THE SEA-LIMITS.
CoNSiDEH the sea's listless chime;
Time's self it is, made audible, —
The iniinmir of the earth's own
shell.
Secret continuance sublime
Is the era's end. Our sight may
pass
Xo furlong farther. Since time
was.
This sound hath told the lapse of
time.
N"o quiet which is death's, — it hath
The mournfulness of ancient life,
Enduring always at dull strife.
As the M'orld's heart of rest and
wrath,
Its painful pulse is on the sands.
Lost utterly, the whole sky stands
Gray and not known along its path.
Listen alone beside the sea,
Listen alone among the woods;
Those voices of twin solitudes
Shall have one sound alike to thee.
Hark where the murmurs of
thronged men
Surge and sink back and surge
again, —
Still the one voice of wave and tree.
Gather a shell from the strewn beach.
And listen at its lips; they sigh
The same desire and mystery,
The echo of the whole sea's speech.
And all mankind is thus at heart
Not anything but what thou art;
And earth, sea, man, are all in each.
THE BLESSED DAMOZEL.
The blessed damozel leaned out
From the gold bar of heaven ;
Her eyes were deeper than the depth
Of waters stilled at even;
She had three lilies in her hand.
And the stars in her hair were
seven.
Her robe, ungirt from clasp to hem,
No wrought flowers did adorn,
But a white rose of Mary's gift,
For service neatly woi'n ;
Her hair tliat lay along her back
Was yellow like ripe corn.
Her seemed she scarce had been a
day
One of God's choristers;
The wonder was not yet quite gone
From that still look of hers :
Albeit, to them she left, her day
Had counted as ten years.
It was the rampart of God's house
That she was standing on ;
By God built over the sheer depth
The which his space begun ;
So high, that looking downward
thence
She scarce could see the sun.
It lies in heaven, across the flood
Of ether, as a bridge.
Beneath, the tides of day and night
With flame and darkness ridge
The void, as low as where this earth
Spins like a fretful midge.
Heard hardly, some of her new
friends
Amid their loving games
Spake evermore among themselves
Their virginal chaste names;
And the souls mounting up to God
Went by her like thin flames ;
And still she bowed herself and
stopped
Out of the circling charm ;
Until her bosom must have made
The bar she leaned on warm,
And the lilies lay as if asleep
Along her bended arm.
From the fixed place of heaven she
saw
Time like a pulse shake fierce
Through all the worlds. Her gaze
still strove
Within the gulf to pierce
468
SANQSTER.
The path; and now she spoke as
when
The stars sang in their spheres.
'* I wish that he M'ere come to me.
For he will come," she said.
"Have I not prayed in heaven? —
on earth,
Lord, Lord, lias he not prayed ?
Are not two prayers a perfect
strength ?
And shall I feel afraid ? "
She gazed and listened, and then said,
Less sad of speech than mild, —
"All this is when he comes." She
ceased.
The light thrilled toward her, filled
With angels in strong level flight.
Her eyes prayed, and she smiled.
(I saw her smile.) But soon their
path
Was vague in distant spheres ;
And then she cast her arms along
The golden barriers
And laid her face between her hands.
And wept. (I heard her tears. )
LOST DAYS.
The lost days of my life until to-day.
What were they, could I see them on
the street
Lie as they fell ? Would they be ears
of wheat
Sown once for food but trodden into
clay ?
Or golden coins squandered and still
to pay ?
Or drops of blood dabbling the guilty
feet ?
Or such spilt water as in dreams
must cheat
The throats of men in hell, who thirst
alway ?
I do not see them here; but after
death
God knows I know the faces I shall
see,
Each one a murdered self, with low
last breath:
" I am thyself , what hast thou done
to me '?"
"And I — and I — thyself " — lo, each
one saith —
" And thou thyself to all eternity! "
Margaret E. Sangster.
OUR OWN.
If I had known in the mornin^^
How wearily all the day [mind
The words unkind would trouble my
That I said when you went away,
I had been more careful, darling.
Nor given you needless jjain ; "
But we vex our own with look and
tone
We may never take back again.
For though in the quiet evening
You may give me the kiss of peace,
Yet it well might be that never for me
The pain of the heart should cease I
How many go forth at morning
AVho never come home at night !
And hearts have broken forliarsh
words spoken.
That sorrow can ne'er set right.
We have careful thought for the
stranger.
And smiles for the sometime guest ;
But oft for our own the bitter tone,
Though we love our own the best.
Ah! lips with the curve impatient.
Ah ! brow with the shade of scorn,
'Twere a cruel fate, were the night
too late
To mado the work of the morn !
SUFFICIENT UNTO THE DAY.
Because in a day of my days to
come
There waiteth a grief to be.
Shall my heart grow faint, and my
lips be dumb
In this day that is bright for me ?
SAROENT.
469
Because of a subtle sense of pain,
Like a pulse-beat threaded through
The bliss of uiy thought, shall 1 dare
refrain
From delight in the pure and true ?
In the harvest fields shall I cease to
glean
Since the summer bloom has sped ?
Shall I veil mine eyes to the noon-
day sheen [fled ?
Since the dew of the morn hath
Nay, phantom ill with the warning
hand
Nay, ghosts of the weary past,
Serene, as in armor of faith, I stand,
You may not hold me fast.
Your shadows across my sun may
fall,
But as bright the sun shall shine.
For I walk in a light ye cannot
pall.
The light of the King Divine.
And whatever the shades from day to
day,
I am sure that His name is Love,
And He never will let me lose my
way
To my rest in His home above.
Epes Sargent.
SOUL OF MY SOUL.
SouT. of my soul, impart
Thy energy divine!
Inform and fill this languid heart,
And make Thy purpose mine.
Thy voice is still and small.
The world's is loud and rude;
Oh, let me hear Thee over all.
And be, through love, renewed.
Give me the mind to seek
Thy perfect will to know ;
And lead me, tractable and meek.
The way I ought to go.
Make quick my spirit's ear
Thy faintest word to hear;
Soul of my soul ! be ever near
To guide me in my need.
A LIFE ON THE OCEAN WAVE.
A LIFE on the ocean wave,
A home on the rolling deep;
Where the scattered waters rave,
And the winds their revels keep!
Like an eagle caged, I pine
On this dull, imehanging shore:
Oh, give me the flashing brine.
The spray and the tempest's roar!
Once more on the deck I stand.
Of my own swift-gliding craft:
Set sail! farewell to the land!
The gale follows fair abaft,
We shoot through the sparkling foam
Like an ocean-bird set free ; —
Like the ocean-bird, our home
We'll find far out on the sea.
The land is no longer in view,
The clouds have begun to frown ;
But with a stout vessel and crew,
We'll say. Let the storm come
down !
And the song of our hearts shall be.
While the winds and the waters
rave,
A home on the rolling sea !
A life on the ocean wave !
FORGET ME NOT.
" Forget me not ? " Ah, words of
useless warning
To one whose heart is henceforth
memory's shrine!
Sooner the skylark might forget the
morning,
Than I forget a look, a tone of
thine.
470
SARGENT.
Sooner the sunflower might forget
to waken
When the first radiance hghts the
eastern hill,
Than I, by daily thoughts of thee
forsaken,
Feel, as they kindle, no expanding
thrill.
Oft, when at night the deck I'm pac-
ing lonely
Or when I pause to watch some
fulgent star.
Will Contemplation be retracing only
Thy form, and fly to greet thee,
though afar.
When storms unleashed, with fearful
clangor sweeping,
Drive our strained bark along the
hollowed sea.
When to the clouds the foam-topped
waves are leaping.
Even then I'll not forget, beloved
one, thee!
Thy image in my sorrow-shaded
hours.
Will, like a sunburst on the watei-s,
shine; [flowers
'Twill be as grateful as the breath of
From some green island wafted
o'er the brine.
And O sweet lady, when, from home
departed,
I count the leagues between us with
a sigh, —
When, atthe thought, perchance a
tear has started,
May I not dream in heart thou'rt
sometimes nigh?
Ay, thou wilt, sometimes, when the
wine-cup passes.
And friends are gathering round in
festal glee.
While bright eyes flash, as flash the
brimming glasses,
Let silent Memory pledge one
health to me.
Farewell! My fatherland is disap-
pearing [sight;
Faster and faster from my baffled
The winds rise wildly, and thick
clouds are rearing
Their ebon flags, that hasten on
the night,
Farewell! The pilot leaves us; sea-
ward gliding.
Our brave ship dashes through the
foamy swell ;
But Hope, lorever faithful and abid-
iiig'
Hears distant welcomes in this last
farewel*! !
A THOUGHT OF THE PAST.
I AVAKF,i> from slumber at the dead
of night.
Moved by a dream too heavenly
fair to last —
A dream of boyhood's season of de-
light;
It flashed along the dim shapes of
the past;
And, as I mused upon its strange
appeal.
Thrilling me with emotions unde-
flned,
Old memories, bursting from Time's
icy seal.
Hushed, like sun-stricken fountains
on my mind.
Scenes where my lot was cast in life's
young day ;
My favorite haunts, the shores, the
ancient woods.
Where, with my schoolmates, I was
wont to stray ;
Green, sloping lawns, majestic soli-
tudes —
All rose to view, more beautiful than
then; —
They faded, and I wept — a child
again !
THE SPRING-TIME WILL RETURN.
The birds are mute, the bloom is fled,
Cold, cold, the north winds blow;
And radiant summer lieth dead
Beneath a shroud of snow.
Sweet summer! well may we regret
Thy brief, too brief sojourn ;
SAB GENT.
471
But, while we grieve, we'll not forget,
The spring-time will return !
Dear friend, the hills rise bare and
bleak
That bound thy future years ;
Clouds veil the sky, no golden streak,
No rainbow light appears;
Mischance has tracked thy fairest
schemes.
To wreck — to whelm — to burn ;
But wintry-dark though Fortune
seems.
The spring-time will return !
Beloved one! where no sunbeams
shine
Thy mortal frame we laid ;
But oh, thy spirit's form divine
Waits no sepulchral shade !
No, by those hopes which, plumed
with light,
The sod, exulting, spurn.
Love's paradise sliall bloom more
bright —
The Spi'ing-time will return !
A SUMMER NOON AT SEA.
A HOLY stillness, beautiful and deep,
Keigns in the air and broods upon
the ocean ;
The \Yorn-out winds are quieted to
sleep.
And not a wave is lifted into mo-
tion.
The sea-bird skims along the glassy
tide,
With sidelong flight and wing of
glittering whiteness,
Or floats upon the sea, outstretching
wide
A sheet of gold in the meridian
brightness.
Our vessel lies, unstirred by wave or
blast,
As she were moored to lier dark
shadow seeming.
Her pennon twined around the taper-
ing mast.
And her loose sails like marble
drapery gleaming.
How, at an hour like this, the unruf-
fled mind
Partakes the quiet that is shed
around us !
As if the Power tliat chained the im-
patient wind
With the same fetter of repose had
bomid us !
TROPICAL WEATHER.
Now' we're afloat upon the tropic sea:
Here Summer holdeth a perpetual
reign.
How flash the waters in their bound-
ing glee !
The sky's soft purple is without a
stain.
Full in our wake the smooth, warm
trade-winds blowing.
To their unvarying goal still faith-
ful run ;
And, as we steer, with sails before
them flowing.
Nearer the zenith daily climbs the
sun.
The startled flying-fish around us
skim.
Glossed like the humming-bird,
with rainbow dyes ;
And, as they dip into the water's
brim.
Swift in pursuit the preying dol-
phin hies.
All, all is fair; and gazing round, we
feel
Over the yielding sense the torrid
languor steal.
CUBA.
What sounds arouse me from my
slmnbers light ?
'•'Land ho! all Jiands, ahoij!^'
— I'm on the deck:
'Tis early dawn: the day-star yet is
bright ;
mm
A few white vapory bars the zenith
fleclv;
And lo! along the horizon, bold and
high,
The purple hills of Cuba ! Hail, all
hail!
Isle of undying verdiu'e, with thy
sky
Of purest azure! Welcome, odor-
ous gale !
O scene of life and joy! thou art
arrayed
In hues of unimagined loveliness.
Sing louder, brave old mariner! and
aid
My swelling heart its rapture to
express ; [more
For, from enclianted memory, never
Shall fatle this dawn sublime, this
fair, resplendent shore.
MiNOT JuDSON Savage.
PESCADERO PEBBLES.
Where slopes the beach to the set-
ting sun.
On the Pescadero shore,
For ever and ever the restless surf
Rolls up with its sullen roar.
And grasping the pebbles in white
hands,
And chafing theni together.
And grinding them against the cliffs
In stormy and sunny weather.
It gives them never any rest;
All day, all night, the pain
Of their long agony sobs on.
Sinks, and then swells again.
And tourists come from every clime
To search with eager care,
For those whose rest has been the
least :
For such have grown most fair.
But yonder, I'ound a point of rock,
In a quiet, sheltered cove.
Where storm ne'er breaks, and sea
ne'er comes.
The tourists never rove.
The pebbles lie 'neath the sunny sky
Quiet f oi'evermore ;
In dreams of everlasting peace
They sleep upon the shore.
But ugly, and rough, and jagged still.
Are they left by the passing years ;
For they miss the beat of angry
storms,
And the sm-f that drips in tears.
The hard turmoil of the pitiless sea
Tm-ns the pebble to beauteous gem,
They who escape the agony
Miss also the diadem.
LIFE IN DEATH.
New being is from being ceased ;
No life is but by death ;
Something's expiring everywhere
To give some other breath.
There's not a flower that glads the
spring
I}ut blooms upon the grave
Of its dead i)arent seed, in which
Its forms of beauty wave.
The oak, that like an ancient tower
Stands massive on the heath.
Looks out upon a living world.
But strikes its roots in death.
The cattle on a thousand hills
Clip tlie sweet buds that grow
Rank from the soil enriched by herds
Sleeping long years below.
To-day is but a structure built
Upon dead yesterday ;
And Progress hews her temple-stones
From wrecks of old decay.
SAXE.
473
Then monrn not death ; 'tis but a stair
Built with divinest art,
Up which the deathless footsteps
climb
Of loved ones who depart.
LIGHT ON THE CLOUD.
There's never an always cloudless
sky,
There's never a vale so fair,
But over it sometimes shadows lie
In a chill and songless air.
But never a cloud o'erhung the day.
And flung its shadows down.
But on its heaven-side gleamed some
ray
Forming a sunshine crown.
It is dark on only the downward side ;
Though rage the tempest loud,
And scatter its terrors far and wide.
There's light upon the cloud.
And often, when it traileth low,
Shutting the landscajje out.
And only the chilly east-winds blow
From the foggy seas of doubt.
There'll come a time, near the setting
sun.
When the joys of life seem few,
A rift will break in the evening dim,
And the golden light stream
through.
And the soul a glorious bridge will
make
Out of the golden bars.
And all its priceless treasures take
Where shine the eternal stars.
John Godfrey Saxe.
THE OLD MAX'S MOTTO.
" Give me a motto," said a youth
To one whom years had rendered
wise ;
*' Some pleasant thought, or weighty
truth.
That briefest syllables comprise ;
Some word'^of warning or of cheer
To grave upon my signet here.
"And, reverend father," said the
boy,
" Since life, they say, is ever made
A mingled web of grief and joy ;
Since cares may come and pleas-
ures fade, —
Pray, let the motto have a range
Of meaning matching every change."
"Sooth!" said the sire. " methinks
you ask
A labor something over-nice.
That well a finer brain might task.
What think you. lad, of this device
(Older than I, though I am gray).
'Tis simple, — ' This will pass away.'
" When wafted on by Fortune's
breeze.
In endless peace thou seem'st to
glide,
Prepare betimes for rougher seas,
And check the boast of foolish
pride ;
Though smiling joy is thine to-day.
Remember, ' This will pass away ! '
" When all the sky is draped in black,
And, beaten by tempestuous gales.
Thy shuddering ship seems all a-
wrack.
Then trim again thy tattered sails ;
To grim Despair be not a prey;
Betiaink thee, ' This will pass away.'
" Thus, O my son, be not o'er-proud.
Nor yet cast down; judge thou
aright ;
When skies are clear, expect the
cloud ;
In darkness, wait the coming light;
Whatever be thy fate to-day.
Remember, ' This will pass away!' "
474
SAXE.
I'M GROWING OLD.
My days pass pleasantly away;
My nights are blest with sweetest
sleep ;
I feel no symptoms of decay;
I liave no cause to mourn nor weep ;
My foes are impotent and shy ;
My friends are neither false nor
cold.
And yet, of late, I often sigh, —
I'm growing old!
My growing talk of olden times,
My growing thirst for early news,
My growing apathy to rhymes.
My growing love of easy shoes.
My growing hate of crowds and noise,
My growing fear of taking cold.
All whisper, in the plainest voice,
I'm growing old!
I'm growing fonder of my staff;
I'm growing dimmer in the eyes;
I'm growing fainter in my laugh;
I'm growing deeper in my sighs;
I'm growing careless of my dress;
I'm growing frugal of my gold;
I'm growing wise; I'm growing, —
yes,—
I'm growing old!
I see it in my changing taste;
I see it in my changing hair;
I see it in my growing waist;
I see it in my growing heir;
A thousand signs proclaim the truth.
As plain as truth was ever told.
That, even in my vaunted youth
I'm growing old.
Ah me ! my very laurels breathe
The tale in my reluctant ears.
And every boon the Hours bequeath
But makes me debtor to the Years I
E'en Flattery's honeyed words declare
The secret she would fain withhold ;
And tells me in " How young you
are!"
I'm growing old.
Thanks for the years ! — whose rapid
flight
My sombre Muse too sadly sings ;
Thanks for the gleams of golden
light
That tint the darkness of their
wings ;
The light that beams from out the
sky.
Those heavenly mansions to unfold
Where all are blest, and none may
sigh,
"I'm growing old!"
SOMEWHERE.
Somewhere — somewhere a happy
clime there is,
A land that knows not unavailing
woes,
^Yhere all the clashing elements of
this
Discordant scene are hvished in
deep repose.
Somewhere — somewhere (ah me,
that land to win!)
In some bright realm, beyond the
farthest main.
Where trees of knowledge bear no
fruit of sin.
And buds of pleasure blossom not in
pain.
Somewhere — somewhere an end of
mortal strife
With our immortal yearnings ; nev-
ermore
The outer warring with the inner life
Till both are wretched! Ah, that
happy shore !
Where shines for aye the soul's reful-
gent sun,
And life is love, and love and joy are
one!
LITTLE JERRY, THE MILLER.
Beneath the hill you may see the
mill
Of wasting wood and crumbling
stone ;
The wheel is dripping and clattering
still.
But Jerry, the miller, is dead and
gone.
Year after year, early and late,
Alike in summer and winter
weather,
He pecked the stones and calked the
gate.
And mill and miller grew old to-
gether.
"Little Jerry I" — 'twas all the
same, —
They loved him well who called
him so;
And whether he'd ever another name,
Nobody ever seemed to know.
'Twas, "Little Jerry, come grind my
rye";
And '• Little Jerry, come grind my
wheat " ;
And "Little Jerry" was still the
cry,
From matron bold and maiden
sweet.
'Twas, "Little Jerry" on every
tongue,
And so the simple truth was told ;
For Jerry was little when he was
young.
And Jerry was little whon he was
old.
But what in size he chanced to lack.
That Jerry made up in being strong ;
I've seen a sack upon his back
As thick as the miller, and quite as
long.
Always busy, and always merry,
Always doing his very best,
A notable wag was little Jerry,
Who uttered well his standing jest.
How Jerry lived is known to fame.
But how he died there's none may
know ;
One autumn day the rumor came,
"The brook and Jerry are very
low."
And then 'twas whispered, mourn-
fully, •
The leech had come, and he was
dead ;
And all the neighbors flocked to see;
"Poor little Jerry!" was all they
said.
They laid him in his earthly bed, —
His miller's coat his only shroud;
" Dust to dust," the parson said.
And all the people wept aloud.
For he had shunned the deadly sin,
And not a grain of over-toll
Had ever dropped into his bin,
To weigh upon his parting soul.
Beneath the hill there stands the mill ,
Of wasting wood and crumbling
stone; [still,
The wheel is dripping and clattering
But Jerry, the miller, is dead and
gone.
WOULDN'T YOU LIKE TO KNOW?
A MADUIUAL.
I KNOW a girl with teeth of pearl.
And shoulders white as snow;
She lives, — ah! well,
I must not tell, —
Wouldn't you like to know ?
Her sunny hair is wondrous fair,
And wavy in its flow ;
Who made it less
One little tress. —
Wouldn't you like to know ?
Her eyes are blue (celestial hue!)
And dazzling in their glow;
On whom they beam
With meltiiag gleam, —
Wouldn' t you like to know ?
Her lips are red and finely wed,
Like roses ere they blow ;
What lover sips
Those dewy lips, —
Wouldn't you like to know ?
Her fingers are like lilies fair
When lilies fairest grow ;
Whose hand they press
With fond caress, —
Wouldn't you like to know ?
476
SCOTT.
Her foot is small, and has a fall
Like snow-flakes on the snow;
And where it goes
Beneath the rose, —
Wouldn't you like to know '?
She has a name, the sweetest name
That language can bestow.
'Twould break the spell
If I should tell, —
Wouldn't you like to know ?
but
TREASURE IN HEAVEN.
Every coin of earthly treasure
We have lavished, upon earth,
For our simple worldly pleasure.
May be reckoned something worth ;
For the spending was not losing,
Though the purchase were
small;
It has perished with the using;
We have had it, — that is ail !
All the gold we leave behind us
When we turn to dust again
(Though our avarice may blind us),
We have gathered quite in vain ;
Since we neither can direct it.
By the winds of fortune tossed,
Nor in other worlds expect it;
What we hoarded, we have lost.
But each merciful oblation —
(Seed of pity wisely sown).
What we gave in self-negation,
We may safely call our own ;
For the treasure freely given
Is the treasure that we hoard,
Since the angels keep in Heaven
What is lent unto the Lord I
TO MY LOVE.
' Da mi basia.
-Catullus.
Kiss me softly, and speak to me
low;
Malice has ever a vigilant ear;
What if Malice were lurking near?
Kiss me, dear!
Kiss me softly and speak to me low.
Kiss me softly and speak to me low; "
Envy too has a watchful ear ;
What if Envy should chance to hear?
Kiss me, dear!
Kiss me softly and speak to me low.
Kiss me softly and speak to me low ;
Trust me, darling, the time is near
When we may love with never a
fear ;
Kiss me, dear!
Kiss me softly and speak to me low.
Sir Walter Scott.
[From The Lady of the Lake.]
S UMMER DA WN A T LOCH KA TRINE.
The summer dawn's reflected hue
To purple changed Loch Katrine
blue ;
Mildly and soft the western breeze
Just kissed the lake, just stirred the
trees.
And the pleased lake, like maiden coy,
Trembled but dimpled not for joy;
The mountain shadows on her breast
Were neither broken nor at rest ;
In bright vnicertainty they lie.
Like future joys to Fancy's eye.
The water-lily to the light
Her chalice reared of silver bright;
The doe awoke, and to the lawn,
Begemmed with dew-drops, led her
fawn ;
gray mist left the mountain
side,
torrent showed its glistening
pride ;
Invisible in flecked sky,
The lark sent down her revelry ;
The
The
A SCENE IN THE HIGHLANDS.
Page 477.
SCOTT.
477
The blackbird and the speckled
thrush
Good-morrow gave from brake and
bush :
In answer cooed the cushat dove
Her notes of peace, and rest, and
love.
IFrom The Lady of the Lake.]
A SCENE IN THE HIGHLANDS.
The western waves of ebbing day-
Rolled o'er the glen their level way;
Each purple peak, each flinty spire,
Was bathed in floods of living hre,
But not a setting beam could glow
Within the dark ravines below,
Where twined the path in shadow
hid,
Round many a rocky pyramid.
Shooting abruptly from the dell
Its thunder-splintered pinnacle;
Round many an insulated mass,
The native bulwarks of the pass,
Huge as the tower which builders
vain
Presumptuous piled on Shinar's plain.
The rocky summit, split and rent.
Formed turret, dome, or battlement,
Or seemed fantastically set
With cupola or minaret.
Wild crests as pagod ever decked
Or mosque of Eastern architect.
Nor were these earth-born castles
bare.
Nor lacked they many a banner fair;
For, from tlieir shivered brows dis-
played.
Far o'er the unfathomable glade.
All twinkling with the dewdrops
sheen.
The brier-rose fell in streamers green.
And creeping shrubs, of thousand
dyes.
Waved in the west-wind's summer
sighs.
Boon nature scattered, free and wild.
Each plant or flower, the mountain's
child.
Here eglantine embalmed the air.
Hawthorn and hazel mingled there;
The primrose pale and violet flower.
Found in each cliff a narrow bower;
Fox-glove and night-shade, side by
side.
Emblems of punishment and pride.
Grouped their dark hues with every
stain
The weather-beaten crags retain.
With boughs that quaked at every
breath,
Gray birch and aspen wept beneath ;
Aloft the ash and warrior oak
Cast anclior in the rifted rock ;
And, higher yet, the pine-tree hung
His shattered trunk, and frequent
flung,
Where seemed the cliffs to meet on
high.
His boughs athwart the narrowed
sky.
Highest of all, where white peaks
glanced.
Where glist'ning streamers waved
and danced.
The wanderer's eye could barely view
The summer heaven's delicious blue;
So wondrous wild, the whole might
seem
The scenery of a fairy dream.
IFrom The Lady of the Lake.}
A PICTURE OF ELLEN.
And ne'er did Grecian chisel trace
A Nymph, a Naiad, or a Grace,
Of finer form, or lovelier face!
What though the sun, with ardent
frown,
Had slightly tinged her cheek with
brown, —
The sportive toil, which, short and
light,
Had dyed her glowing hue so bright.
Served too in hastier swell to show
Short glimpses of a breast of snow:
What though no rule of courtly
grace
To measured mood had trained her
pace, —
A foot more light, a step more true.
Ne'er from the heath-flower dashed
the dew ;
E'en the slight harebell raised its
head,
Elastic from her airy tread ;
478
SCOTT.
What though upon her speech there
hung
The accents of her mountain
tongue, —
Those silver sounds so soft, so dear,
The hstener held his hreath to hear!
\_From The Lady of the Lake.']
PATERNAL LOVE.
Some feelings are to mortals given,
With less of earth in them than
heaven:
And if there be a human tear
From passion's dross reiined and
clear,
A tear so limpid and so meek.
It would not stain an angel's cheek,
'Tis that which pious fathers shed
Upon a duteous daughter's head!
[From The Lay of the Last Minstrel.]
MELROSE ABBEY BY MOOX-
LIGHT.
If thou would' St view fair Melrose
aright.
Go visit it by the pale moonlight;
For the gay beams of lightsome day
Gild, but to flout, the ruins gray.
When the broken arches are black in
night.
And each shafted oriel glimmers
white ;
When the cold light's imcertain
shower
Streams on tlie ruined central tower;
When buttress and butti-ess, alter-
nately,
Seem framed of ebon and ivory ;
When silver edges the imagery.
And the scrolls that teach thee to
live and die;
When distant Tweed is heard to rave.
And the owlet to hoot o'er the dead
man's grave.
Then go — but go alone the while —
Then view St. David's ruined pile;
And, home returning, soothly swear,
Was never scene so sad and fair!
[From The Lay of the Last Minstrel.]
LOVE.
In peace. Love tunes the shepherd's
reed ;
In war he mounts the warrior's steed ;
In halls, in gay attire is seen;
In hamlets, dances on the green.
Love rules the court, the camp, the
grove.
And men below, and saints above ;
For love is heaven, and heaven is
love.
True love's the gift which God has
given
To man alone beneath the heaven ;
It is not fantasy's hot fire.
Whose wishes, soon as gi'anted
fly;
It livetli not in fierce desire.
With dead desire it doth not die;
It is the secret sympathy,
The silver link, the silken tie,
AVhich heart to heart, and mind to
mind.
In body and in soul can bind.
[From- The Lay tlie world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely
players ;
They have their exits and their en-
trances.
And one man in his time plays many
parts,
His acts being seven ages. At first
the infant, [arms.
Mewling and puking in his nurse's
And then, the whining school-boy,
with his satchel
And shining morning face, creeping
like snail
T'nwillingly to school. And then,
the lover,
Sighing like furnace, with a woful
ballad
Made to his mistress' eyebrow. Then,
the soldier,
Full of strange oaths, and bearded
like the pard,
Jealous in honor, sudden and quick
in quarrel ;
Seeking the bubble reputation
Even in the cannon's mouth. And
then, the justice.
In fair round belly, with good capon
lined.
With eyes severe, and beard of formal
cut,
Full of wise saws and modern in-
stances ;
And so he plays his part. The sixth
age shifts
Into the lean and slippered pantaloon,
With spectacles on nose, and pouch
on side;
Mis youthful hose well saved, a world
too wide
For his shrunk shanks ; and his big
manly voice.
Turning again towards childish
treble, pipes
And whistles in his sound. Last
scene of all
That ends this strange eventful his-
tory.
Is second childishness, and mere ob-
livion:
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans
evervthing.
[From As You Like II.]
INGRATITUDE.
Blow, blow, thou winter wiutl.
Thou art not so unkind
As man's ingratitude!
Thy tooth is not so keen.
Because thou art not seen,
Although thy breath be rude.
Heigh-ho! sing, heigh-ho! inito the
green holly :
Most friendship is feigning, most
loving mere folly :
Then heigh-ho ! the holly !
This life is most jolly.
Freeze, freeze, thou l)itter sky,
That dost not bite so nigh
As benefits forgot !
Though thou the waters Avarp,
Thy sting is not so sharp
As friend remembered not.
"Heigh-ho! sing heigh-ho, t.
But being seasoned w'ith a gracious
voice.
Obscures the show of evil ? In re-
ligion.
What dannied error, but some sober
brow
Will bless it, and approve it with a
text.
Hiding the grossness with fair orna-
ment ?
There is no voice so simple, but as-
sumes
Some mark of virtue on its outward
parts.
How many cowards, whose hearts are
all as false
48G
SHAKESPEARE.
As stairs of sand, wear yet upon their
chins
The beards of Hercules and frowning
Mars ;
Who, inward searched, have Uvers
white as milk !
And these assume but valor's excre-
ment,
To render them redoubted. Look on
beauty,
And you shall see 'tis purchased by
the weight,
Wliich therein works a miracle in
nature,
Making them lightest that wear most
of it.
So are those crisped, snaky, golden
locks,
Which make such wanton gambols
with the wind
Upon supposed fairness, often known
To be the dowry of a second head,
The skull that bred tliem in the sep-
ulchre.
Thus ornament is l)ut the guiled
shore
To a most dangerous sea; the beau-
teous scarf
Veiling an Indian beauty; in a word.
The seeming truth which cunning
times put on
To entrap the wisest.
[From The Merchant of Venice.]
MERCY.
TiiK quality of mercy is not strained ;
It droppeth as the gentle rain from
heaven
Upon the place beneath. It is twice
blessed ;
It blesseth him that gives, and him
that takes.
'Tis mightiest in the mightiest; it be-
comes
The throned monarch better than his
crown :
His sceptre shows the force of tempo-
ral power.
The attribute to awe and majesty.
Wherein doth sit the dread and fear
of kings.
But mercy is above the sceptred
sway ;
It is enthroned in the hearts of kings ;
It is an attribute to God himself;
And earthly power doth then show
likest God's,
When mercy seasons justice.
[From Troilus and Cressida.']
CONSTANT EFFOllT NECESSARY
TO SUPPORT FAME.
TiMK hath, my lord, a wallet at
his l)ack.
Wherein he puts alms for oblivion,
A great-sized monster for ingrati-
tudes :
Those scraps are good deeds past:
which are devoured
As fast as they are made, forgot as
soon
As done : Perseverance, dear my lord,
Keeps honor bright: To have done,
is to hang
Quite out of fashion, like a rusty
mail
In monumental mockery. Take the
instant way ;
For honor travels in a strait so nar-
row.
Where one but goes abreast: keep
then the path ;
For emulation hath a thousand sons,
That one by one pursue. If you give
way.
Or hedge aside from the direct forth-
right.
Like to an entered tide, they all rush
by.
And leave you hindmost ; —
Or, like a gallant horse fallen in first
rank,
Lie there for pavement to the abject
rear,
O'erruu and trampled on. Then what
they do in present.
Though less than yours in past, must
o'ertop yours:
For time is like a fashionable host
Tliat slightly shakes his parting guest
by the hand;
And with his arms outstretched, as
he would fly.
Grasps in the comer. Welcome ever
smiles '
SHAKESPEARE.
487
And farewell goes out sighing. O,
let not virtue seek
Remuneration for the thing it was;
For beauty, wit,
High birth, vigor of bone, desert in
service,
Love, friendship, charity, are sub-
jects all
To envious and calumniating time.
One touch of nature makes the whole
world kin, —
That all with one consent, praise new-
boi'n gauds,
Though they are made and moulded
of things past;
And give to dust, that is a little gilt,
More laud than gilt o'er-dusted.
The present eye praises the present
object:
Then marvel not, thou great and
complete man,
That all the Greeks begin to worship
Ajax;
.Since things in motion sooner catcli
the eye
Than what not stirs.
[From Henrij I'll/.]
LIFE'S VICISSiri'DES.
Fai!EWEli., a long farewell to all my
greatness !
'I'his is the state of man: To-day he
puts forth
The tender leaves of hope, to-morrow
blossoms,
And bears his blushing honors thick
upon him ;
The third day comes a frost, a killing
frost.
And when he thinks, good easy man,
full surely
His greatness is a ripening, nips his
root
And then he falls as I do. I have
ventured.
Like little wanton boys, that swim on
bladders,
These many summers in a sea of
glory •
But far l)eyond my depth: my high-
blown pride
At length broke uutler lue; and now
has left me,
Weary and old with service, to the
mercy
Of a rude stream, that must for ever
hide me.
Vain pomp and glory of this world, I
hate ye !
[From Measure for Measurc.1
FEAR OF DEATH.
Ay, but to die, and go we know not
where ;
To lie in cold obstruction, and to rot;
Tliis sensible warm motion to become
A kneaded clod; and the delighted
spirit
To bathe in fiery floods, or to reside
In thrilling regions of thick-ribbed
ice;
To be imprisoned in the viewless
winds.
And blown with restless violence
rounil about
The pendent world: or to be worse
than worst
Of those, that lawless and incertain
thoughts
Imagine howling: 'tis too horrible!
The weariest and most loathed
worldly life.
That age, ache, penury, and impris-
onment
Can lay on nature, is a paradise
To what we fear of death!
[From The Tempest.]
EXD OF ALL EARTHLY GLORY.
Ouii revels now are ended : these our
actors,
As I foretold you. were all spirits,
and
Are melted into air, into thin air;
And, like the baseless fabric of this
vision.
The cloud-capt towers, the gorgeous
palaces.
The solemn temples, the great globe
itself,
Yea, all which \t inherit, shall dis-
solve:
And, like this insubstantial pageant
faded,
Leave not a rack behind! We are
such stuff
As dreams are made of, and our little
life
Is rounded with a sleep.
[From Cijmbelbie.']
FEAR lYO MOUK.
Fkar no more the heat o' the sun.
Nor the furious winter's rages;
Thou thy worldly task hast done.
Home art gone, and ta'en thy
wages :
Oolden lads and girls all must.
As chimney-sweepers, come to dust.
Fear no more the frown o' the great.
Thou art past the tyrant's stroke;
Care no more to clothe and eat.
To thee the reed is as the oak.
The sceptre, learning, physic, must.
All follow this, and come to dust.
Fear no more the lightning-flash.
Nor th' all-dreaded thunder-stone;
Fear not slander, censure rash,
Thou hast finished joy and moan.
All lovers young, all lovers must.
Consign to thee, and come to dust,
[From J'euun (tnd .U/oiiis.]
THE HOnSE OF ADOXfS.
Look, when a painter woidd sui'pass
the life.
In limning out a w(>ll-proportioned
steed.
His art with Nature's workmanship
at strife,
As if the dead the living should ex-
ceed :
So did this horse excel a common
one
In shape, in courage, color, pace and
bone.
Hound-hoofed, short-jointed, fetlocks
shag and long.
Broad breast, full eyes, small head,
and nostrils wide.
High crest, short ears, straight legs,
and passing sti'ong.
Thin mane, thick tail, broad buttock,
tender hide:
Look, what a horse should have, he
did not lack,
.Save a proud rider on so proud a
back.
Sometimes he scuds far off, and then
he stares ;
Anon he starts at stirring of a feather,
To bid the wind a base he now pre-
pares
And whe'r he run, or fly, they know
not whether.
P'or through his mane and tail the
high wind sings,
Fanning the hairs, which wave like
feathered wings.
LOVE, THE SOLACE OF mESENT
CALAMITY.
"Wjiex in disgrace w ith fortune and
men's eyes,
I all alone beweep my outcast state.
And trouble deaf heaven with my
bootless cries, [fate.
And look upon myself, and curse my
Wishing me like to one more rich in
hope.
Featured like him. like him with
friends i^Qssessed,
Desiring this man's art, and that
man's scope,
AVith Avhat I most enjoy contented
least:
Yet in these thoughts myself almost
despising.
Haply I think on thee, — and then
my state [ing
(Like to the lark at break of day aris-
Froni sullen earth) sings hynms at
heaven's gat(>:
For thy sweet love remembered,
such wealth brings,
That then I scorn to change my
state with kings.
HIIAKEiSFEARE.
489
LOVE, THE RETniEVER OF PAST
LOSSES.
AViiEN to the sessions of sweet silent
tliought
I summon up remembrance of tilings
past,
I sigh the lack of many a thing I
sought,
And with old woes new wail my dear
time's waste:
Then can I drown an eye, unused
to flow,
For precious friends hid In death's
dateless night.
And weep afresh love's long-since
cancelled woe,
And moan the expense of many a
vanished sight.
Then can I grieve at grievances fore-
gone,
And heavily from woe to woe tell o'er.
The sad account of fore-bemoaned
moan.
Which 1 new pay as if not paid be-
fore.
But if the while I tliiuk on thee,
dear friend.
All losses are restored, and sorrows
end.
They were but sweet, but figures of
delight,
Drawn after you, you pattern of all
those.
Yet seemed it winter still, and, you
away.
As with your shadow I with these
did play.
A'O spnrxG iriTHouT the he-
LOrED.
Fuoji you have I been absent in the
spring.
When proud pied April, dressed in
all his trim.
Hath put a spirit of youth in every
thing.
That heavy Saturn laughed and
leaped with him.
Yet nor the lays of birds, nor the
sweet smell
Of different tlowers in odor and in
hue,
Could make me any summer's story
tell,
Or from their proud lap pluck them
where they grew.
Nor did I wonder at the lilies white,
Nor praise the deep vermilion in the
rose :
L O VE UNAL TEE ABLE.
Let me not to the marriage of true
minds
Admit impediments. Love is not
love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to re-
move :
O no ! it is an ever-fixed mark,
That looks on tempests, and is never
shaken ;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Wliose worth's unknown, although
his height be taken.
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy
lips and clieeks
Within ids bending sickle's compass
come ;
Love alters not with his brief hours
and weeks
But bears it out e'en to the edge of
doom.
If this be error, and uiion nn;
proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever
loved.
TO MY SOUL.
Poou soul, the centre of my sinful
earth.
Fooled by those rebel powei-s that
thee array.
Why dost thou pine within, and suf-
fer deartli.
Painting thy outward walls so costly
gay '?
Why so large cost, having so short a
lease.
Dost thou upon thy fading mansion
spend ?
490
SHELLEY.
Shall worms, inheritors of this ex-
cess,
Eat up thy charge ? Is this thy
body's end ?
Then, soul, live thou upon thy ser-
vant's loss,
And let that pine to aggravate thy
store :
Buj terms divine in selling hours of
dross ;
Within be fed, without be rich no
more :
So shalt thou feed on death, that
feeds on men.
And, death once dead, there's no
more dying then.
Percy Bysshe Shelley.
OXE WORD TS TOO OFTEN PRO-
FANED.
One word is too often profaned
For me to profane it.
One feeling too falsely disdained
For thee to disdain it.
One hope is too like despair
For prudence to smother.
And pity from thee more dear
Than that from another.
I can give not what men call love.
But wilt thou accept not
The worship the heart lifts above
And the heavens reject not:
The desire of the moth for the star,
Of the night for the morrow.
The devotion to something afar
From the sphere of our sorrow ?
LOVE'S PHILOSOPHY.
V
The fountains.mingle with the river.
And the rivers with the ocean,
The winds of heaven mix forever
With a sweet emotion;
Nothing in the world is single;
All things by a- law divine
In one another's being mingle, —
Why not I with thine ?
See the mountains kiss high heaven.
And the waves clasp one another;
No sister flower would be forgiven
If it disdained its brother;
And the sunlight clasps the earth.
And the nioonbeams kiss the sea;
What are all these kissings worth,
If thou kiss not me ?
TO A SKYLARK.
Haii, to thee, blithe spirit!
Bird thou never wert.
That from heaven, or near it,
Pourest thy full heart [art.
In profuse strains of unpremeditated
Higher still and higher.
From the earth thou springest
Like a cloud of tire;
The blue deep thou wingest,
And singing still dost soar, and soar-
ing ever singest.
In the golden lightning
Of the simken sun.
O'er which clouds are brightening.
Thou dost float and I'un;
Like an unbodied joy whose race is
just begun.
The pale purple even
Melts around thy flight ;
Like a star of heaven,
In the broad daylight
Thou art unseen, but yet I hear thy
shrill delight.
Keen as are the arrows
Of that silver sphere.
Whose intense lamp narrows
In the white dawn clear,
Until we hardly see, we feel that it is
there
All the earth and air
With thy voice is loud.
As, when night is bare.
From one lonely clovid
The moon rains out her beams, and
heaven is overflowed.
What thou art we know not;
What is most like thee ?
From rainbow clouds there flow not
Drops so bright to see,
As from thy presence showers a rain
of melody.
Like a poet hidden
In the light of thought,
Singing hymns unbidden.
Till the world is wrought
To sympathy with hopes and fears it
heeded not:
Like a high-born maiden
In a palace-tower.
Soothing her love-laden
Soul in secret hour
With music sweet as love, which
overflows her bower:
Like a glow-worm golden
In a dell of dew.
Scattering unbeholden
Its aerial hue
Among the flowers and grass, which
screen it from the view :
Like a rose embowered
In its own green leaves.
By warm winds deflowered.
Till the scent it gives
Makes faint with too much sweet
these heavy-winged thieves.
Sound of vernal showers
On the twinkling grass,
Rain-awakened flowers.
All that ever was
Joyous, and clear, and fresh, thy
music doth surpass.
Teach us, sprite or bii'd.
What sweet thoughts are thine:
I have never heard
Praise of love or wine
That panted forth a flood of rapture
so divine.
Chorus hymeneal.
Or triumv)hal chant.
Matched with thine would be all
But an empty vaunt, —
A thing wherein we feel there is some
hidden want.
What objects are the fountains
Of thy happy strain ?
AVhat fields, or waves, or moun-
tains ?
What shapes of sky or plain ?
What love of thine own kind ? what
ignorance of pain ?
With thy clear keen joyance
Languor cannot be :
Shadow of annoyance
Never came near thee :
Thou lovest; but ne'er knew love's
sad satiety.
Waking or asleep.
Thou of death must deem
Things more true and deep
Than we mortals dream,
Or how coidd thy notes flow in such
a crystal stream ?
We look before and after.
And pine for what is not :
Our sincerest laughter
With some pain is fraught ;
Our sweetest songs are those that tell
of saddest thought.
Yet if we coifld scorn
Hate, and pride, and fear;
If we were tilings born
Not to shed a tear,
know not how thy joy we ever
should come near.
Better than all measures
Of delightful sound.
Better than all treasures
That in books are found.
Thy skill to poet were, thou scorner
of tlie ground !
Teach me half the gladness
That thy brain must know.
Such harmonious madness
From my lips would flow,
The world should listen tlien, as I am
listening now.
492
tiHELLEY.
MUSIC, WHEN SOFT VOICES DIE.
Music, when soft voices die,
Vibrates in the memory, —
Odors, wlien sweet .violets sicken,
Live witliin the sense they quiclien.
Rose-leaves, when the rose is dead,
Are heaped for the beloved's bed:
And so thy thoughts, when thou art
gone.
Love itself shall slumber on.
TIME.
Unfatiiomablk Sea! whose waves
are years.
Ocean of Time, whose waters of
deep woe
Are brackish with the salt of human
tears !
Thou shoreless flood, which in thy
ebb and flow
Claspest the limits of mortality !
And sick of prey, yet howling on for
more,
Vomitest thy wrecks on its inhospi-
table shore ;
Treacherous in calm, and terrible in
storm.
Who shall put forth on thee,
Unfathomable Sea ?
THE WOllLirs WANDERERS.
Tell me, thou star, whose wings of
light
Speed tiiee in thy fiery flight.
In what cavern of the night
Will thy pinions close now?
Tell me, moon, thou pale and gray
Pilgrim of heaven's homeless way,
In what depth of night or day
Seekest thou repose now '?
Weary wind, who wanderest
Like the world's rejected guest,
llast thou still some secret nest
On the tree or billow '.*
DEATH.
Dkath is here, and death is there,
Death is busy everywhere,
All around, within, beneath,
Above, is death, — and we are death.
First our pleasures die, — and then
Our hopes, and then our fears, — and
when
These are dead, the debt is due,
Dust claims dust, — and we die too.
All things that we love and cherish.
Like ourselves, nuist fade and i^erish;
Such is our rude mortal lot, —
Love itself woidd, did they not.
THE CLOUD.
I ni:iN(i fresh showers for the thii'st-
ing flowers.
From the seas and the streams ;
I bear light shades for the leaves
when laid
In their noonday dreams.
From my wings are shaken the dews
that waken
The sweet buds every one,
When rocked to rest on their moth-
er's breast.
As she dances about the sun.
1 wield the flail of the lashing hail.
And whiten the green plains under,
And then again 1 dissolve it in rain,
And laugh as I pass in thunder.
I sift the snow on the mountains be-
low,
And their great pines groan aghast ;
And all the night 'tis my pillow
white.
While I sleep in the arms of the
blast.
Sublime on the towers of my skyey
bowers.
Lightning, my pilot sits.
In a cavern under, is fettered the
thunder,
It struggles and howls by fits ;
Over earth and ocean with gentle
motion.
This pilot is guiding me.
Lured by the love of the genii that
move
In the depths of the purple sea ;
Over the rills, and the crags, and the
hills.
Over the lakes and the plains.
Wherever he dream, under mountain
or stream.
The spirit he loves, remains;
And I, all the while, bask in heaven's
blue smile,
Whilst he is dissolving in rains.
The sanguine smarise, with his me-
teor eyes.
And his burning plumes outspread.
Leaps on the back of my sailing rack.
When the morning-star shines
dead.
As on the jag of a mountain crag.
Which an earthquake rocks and
swings.
An eagle alit one moment may sit
In the light of its golden wings.
And Avhen sunset may l)reathe, from
the lit sea beneath.
Its ardors of rest and of love,
And the crimson pall of eve may fall
Fiom the depth of heaven above,
With wings folded I rest, on mine
airy nest,
As still as a brooding dove.
That orbed maiden, with white fire
laden,
AVhom mortals call the moon,
(Hides glimmering o'er my fleece-like
floor.
By the midnight breezes strewn ;
And wherever the beat of her unsceii
feet,
Which only the angels hear,
May have broken the woof of my
tent's thin roof.
The stars peep behind her and
peer;
And I laugh to see them whirl and
flee.
Like a swarm of golden bees.
When I widen the rent in my wind-
built tent.
Till the calm rivers, lakes, and
seas,
Like strips of the sky fallen through
me on high.
Are each paved with the moon and
these,
I bind the sun's throne with a burn-
ing zone, I pearl;
And the moon's with a girdle of
The volcanoes are dim, and the stars
reel and swim.
When the whirlwinds my banner
unfurl.
From cape to cape, v.ith a bridge-
like shape.
Over a torrent sea.
Sunbeam-proof, 1 hang like a roof,
The mountains its columns be.
The triumphal arch through which I
march.
With hurricane, fire, and snow,
When the powers of the air are
chained to my chaii-,
Is the million-colored bow;
The sphere-fire above its soft colors
wove.
While the moist earth was laugh-
ing below.
I am the daughter of earth and water.
And the nursling of the sky:
I pass through the pores of the ocean
and shores;
I change, but I cannot die.
For after the rain, when with never
a stain.
The pavilion of heaven is bare.
And the winds and sunbeams with
their convex gleams.
Build up the blue dome of air,
I silently laugh at my own cenotaph.
And out of the caverns of rain.
Like a child from the womb, like a
ghost from the tomb,
I arise and mibuild it again.
FROM •• THE SEXSiriVE-PLAXr."
A SENSiTiVE-plant in a garden grew.
And the young winds fed it with sil-
ver dew,
And it opened its fan-like leaves to
the light,
And closed them beneath the kisses
of night.
494
SIIKLLEY.
And the spring arose on the garden
fair,
And tlie Spirit of Love fell every-
where;
And each flower and herb on Earth's
dark breast
Kose from the dreams of its wintry
rest.
But none ever trembled and panted
with bliss
In the garden, the field, or the wil-
derness,
Like a doe in the noontide with love's
sweet want,
As the companionless sensitive-plant.
The snowdrop, and then the violet,
Arose from the ground with warm
rain wet.
And tlieir breath was mixed with
fresh odor, sent
From the turf, like the voice and the
instrument.
Then the pied wind-flowers and the
tulip tall.
And narcissi, the fairest among them
alh
Who gaze on their eyes in the
stream's recess,
Till they die of their own dear love-
liness.
And the Xaiad-like lily of the vale.
Whom youth makes so fair and i^as-
sion so pale.
That the light of its tremulous bells
is seen
Through their pavilions of tender
green ;
And the hyacinth purple, and white,
and blue.
Which flung from its bells a sweet
peal anew
Of music so delicate, soft, and in-
tense,
It was felt like an odor within the
sense ;
And the rose like a nymph to the
bath addrest.
Which luiveiled the depth of her
glowing breast.
Till, fold after fold, to the fainting
air
The soul of her beauty and love lay
bare ;
And the Avand-like lily, which lifted
up.
As a Mienad, its moonlight-colored
cup,
Till the flery star, which is its eye,
Gazed through the clear dew on the
tender sky;
And the jessamine faint, and the
sweet tuberose,
The sweetest flower for scent that
blows;
And all rare blossoms from every
clime
Grew in that garden in perfect prime.
And on the stream Avhose inconstant
bosom
Was prankt, under boughs of embow-
ering blossom.
With golden and green light, slanting
through
Their heaven of many a tangled hue,
Broad watei'-lilies lay tremulously.
And starry river-buds glimmered by.
And around them the soft stream did
glide and dance
With a motion of sweet sound and
radiance.
And from this undefiled Paradise
The flowers, — as an infant's awaken-
ing eyes
Smile on its mother, whose singing
sweet
Can first lull, and at last must awaken
it —
When heaven's blithe winds had un-
folded them.
As mine-lamps enkindle a hidden
gem.
Shone smiling to heaven, and every
one
Shared joy in the light of the gentle
smi;
For each one was interpenetrated
With the Hsiht and the odor its neigli-
bor shed,
Like young lovers whom youth and
love make dear.
Wrapped and filled by their mutual
atmosphere.
But the sensitive-plant, which coukl
give small fruit
Of the love which it felt from the
leaf to the root,
Eeceived more than all, it loved more
than ever,
Where none wanted but it, could be-
long to the giver, —
For the sensitive-plant has no briglit
flower ;
Radiance and odor are not its dower :
It loves, even like love, its deep heart
is full, [fui:
It desires what it has not, the beauti-
Fiioyr
'to a lady with a
guitar:-
TwK artist who this idol wrought.
To echo all harmonious thought.
Felled a tree, wliile on the steep
The woods were in tlieir winter sleep.
Rocked in that repose divine
On tlie wind-swept Apennine;
And dreaming, some of autumn past.
And some of spring approaching fast.
And souie of April buds and showers.
And souie of songs in July bowers.
And all of love; and so this tree, —
O that such our death may l)e ! —
Died in sleep, and felt no i)ain.
To live in happier form again:
From wliicli, beneatli heaven's faii-
est star.
The artist wrought this loved guitar.
And taught it justly to reply,
To all who question skilfully.
In language gentle as tliine own;
Whispering in enamored tone
hweet oracles of woods and dells.
And summer winds in sylvan cells;
For it had learnt all harmonies
Of the plains and of the skies.
Of the forests and the mountains.
And tlie many-voiced fountains;
'J'lie clearest echoes of the hills.
The softest notes of falling rills,
The melodies of birds and bees,
The murmuring of sununer seas.
And pattering rain, and breathing
dew.
And airs of evening; and it knew
Tliat seldom-heard mysterious sound,
Wliich, driven on its diurnal round,
As it floats through boundless day.
Our world enkindles on its way, —
All this it knows, but will not tell
To those who cannot question well
The spirit that inhabits it;
It talks according to the wit
Of its companions; and no more
Is heai'd than has been felt before,
By those who tempt it to betray
These secrets of an elder day.
But, sweetly as its answers will
Flatter hands of perfect skill.
It keeps its highest, holiest tone
For our beloved friend alone.
aooD-NiGirr.
Good-night ? ah! no; the hour is ill
Which severs those it should unite;
Let us remain together still,
Then it will be fjood night.
How can I call the lone night good.
Though thy sweet wishes wing its
flight •>
Be it not said, thought, understood.
That it will be goud night.
To hearts which near each other
move [liglit,
From evening close to morning
The night is good ; because, my love,
They never say good-night.
MUTABILITY.
We are as clouds that veil the mid-
night moon ;
How restlessly they speed, and
gleam, and quiver,
Streaking the darkness radiantly! —
yet soon
Night closes round, and they are
lost forever :
Or like forgotten lyres, whose disso- We feel, conceive or reason, laugh or
nant strings ' Aveep;
Give various response to each vary- Embrace fond woe, or cast our
ing blast, | cares away.
To whose frail frame no second mo-
tion brings I It is the same ! — For, be it joy or
One mood or modulation like the sorrow.
last.
We rest — a dream has power to poi-
son sleep :
We rise — one wandering thought
pollutes the day;
The path of its dejiarture still is
free ;
Man's yesterday may ne'er be like
his morrow;
Naught may endure but muta-
bility.
William Shenstone.
STANZAS FliOM ''THE SCIIOOL-
MisriiEssr
In every village marked with little
spire,
Embowered in trees, and hardly
known to fame,
There dwells, in lowly shed, and
mean attire,
A matron old, whom we school-
mistress name;
Who boasts unruly brats with birch
to tame ;
They grieven sore, in piteous dur-
ance pent,
Awed by the power of this relent-
less dame ;
And oft-times, on vagaries idly
bent.
For unkempt hair, or task unconned,
are sorely shent.
And all in sight doth rise a birchen
tree.
Which learning near her little
dome did stow;
Whilom a twig of small regard to
see.
Though now so wide its waving
branches flow, [woe;
And work the simple vassals mickle
For not a wind might curl the
leaves that blew.
But their limbs sliuddered, and
their pulse beat low;
And as they looked they found
their horror grow.
And shaped it into rods, and tingled
at the view.
Near to this dome is found a patch
so green,
On which the tribe their gambols
do display ;
And at the door imprisoning board
is seen.
Lest weakly wights of smaller
size should stray;
Eager, perdie, to bask in sunny day !
The noises intermixed, Mhich
thence resound, [tray;
Do learning's little tenement be-
Where sits the dame, disguised in
look profound
And eyes her fairy throng, and turns
her wheel around.
Her cap, far whiter than the driven
snow.
Emblem right meet of decency
does yield:
Her apron dyed in grain, as blue, I
trow, [field:
As is the harebell that adorns the
And in her hand, for sceptre, she
does wield
Tway birchen sprays ; with anxious
fear entwined.
With dark distrust, and sad re-
pentance filled ;
;^ HEN STONE.
497
And steadfast hate, and sharp af-
fliction joined,
And fury uncontrolled, and chastise-
ment unkind.
A russet stole was o'er her shoulders
thrown ;
A russet kirtle fenced the nipping
air;
'Twas simple russet, hut it was her
own;
'Twas her own country bred the
flock so fair,
'Twas her own labor did tlie fleece
prepare :
And, sooth to say, her pupils,
ranged around.
Through pious awe, did term it
passing rare;
For they in gaping wonderment
abound.
And think no doubt, she been the
greatest wight on ground.
Albeit ne flattery did corrupt her
truth,
Ne pompous title did debauch her
ear;
Goody , good-woman, gossip, n' aunt,
forsooth.
Or dame, the sole additions she did
hear;
Yet these she challenged, these she
held right dear:
Nor would esteem him act as
mought behove.
Who should not honored eld with
tliese revere:
For never title^ yet so mean could
prove.
But there was eke a mind which did
that title love.
One ancient hen she took delight to
feed ;
The plodding pattern of the busy
dame :
Which, ever and anon, impelled by
need.
Into lier school, begirt with chick-
ens, came;
Such favor did her past deport-
ment claim;
And, if neglect had lavished on the
ground
Fragments of bread, she would
collect the same.
For well she knew, and quaintly
could expound.
What sin it were to waste the small-
est crumb she found.
Here oft tlie dame, on Sabbath's de-
cent eve.
Hymned such psalms as Sternhold
forth did mete;
If winter 'twere, she to her hearth
did cleave.
But in her garden found a summer
seat;
Sweet melody to hear her then
repeat
How Israel's sons, beneath a for-
eign king,
Wliile taunting foemen did a song
entreat,
All, for the nonce, untuning every
string,
Uphung their useless lyres — small
heart had they to sing.
For she was ]ust, and friend to vir-
tuous lore,
And passed much time in truly vir-
tuous deed ;
And, in those elfins' ears, would
oft deplore
The times, when truth by popish
rage did bleed ;
And tortuous death was true devo-
tion's meed;
And simple Faith in iron chains did
mourn.
That nould on wooden image
place lier creed ;
And lawnly saints in smouldering
flames did burn :
Ah! dearest Lord, forefend thilk
days should ere return.
In elbow-chair, like that of Scottish
stem.
By the sharp tooth of cankering
eld defaced,
In which, when he receives his di-
adem.
m
498
SHIRLEY.
Our sovereign prince and liefest
liege is jjlaced.
The matron sate; and some with
rank she graced.
(The sonrce of children's and of
courtiers' pride!)
Eedressed affronts, for vile affronts
there passed ;
And warned them not the fretful
to deride,
But love each other dear, whatever
them betide.
Eight well she knew each temper to
desciy ;
To thwart the proud and the sub-
miss to raise ;
Some Avith vile copper-prize exalt
on high,
And some entice with pittance
small of praise;
And other some with baleful sprig
she frays ;
E'en absent, she the reins of power
doth hold.
While with quaint arts, the giddy
crowd she sways,
Forewarned, if little bird their
pranks behold,
'Twill whisper in her ear, and all the
scene imfold.
WRITTEN AT AN JNN AT HENLEY.
To thee, fair Freedom, I retire
From tlattery, cards, and dice, and
din;
Xor art thou found in mansions
higher
Than the low cot or luuiil)!*' Inn.
'Tis here with boundless power I
reign,
And every healtli which I Ijegin
Converts dull port to bright cham-
pagne !
Such freedom crowns it at an inn,
1 fly from pomp, I fly from plate,
1 fly from Falseliood' s specious grin ;
Freedom I love, and form I hate,
And choose my lodgings at an inn.
Here, waiter! take my sordid ore,
Which lackeys else might hope to
win ;
It buys what courts have not in store,
It buys me freedom at an inn.
Whoe'er has travelled life's dull
round,
Where'er his stages may have been.
May sigh to think he still has fouml
His warmest welcome at an inn.
James Shirley.
[From The Contention of AJax and Uli/sscs.]
DEATH THE LEVELLER.
The glories of our birth and state
Are shadows. not substantial things ;
There is no armor against Fate —
Death lays his icy" hand on kings.
Sceptre and crown
Must tum])le down.
And in the dust be equal made
With the poor crooked scythe and
spade.
Some men with swords may reap the
field, [kill;
And plant fresh laurels where they
But their strong nerves at last must
j'ield —
They tame but one another still;
Earlj- or late
They stoop to Fate.
And must give up their miu-nnu'ing
breath,
When they, pale captives, creep to
death.
The garlands Avlther on your brow —
Then boast no more your mighty
deeds ;
Upon Death's purple altar, now.
See where the victor-victim bleeds !
All heads must come
To the cold tomb —
Only the actions of the just
Smell sweet, and blossom in the
dust.
Sir Philip Sidney.
SOXNET TO SLEEP.
Come, sleep, O sleep, the certain knot
of peace,
The baiting-place of wit, tlie balm of
woe.
The poor man's wealth, the prisoner's
release.
The indifferent judge between the
high and low !
With shield of proof, shield me from
out tlie prease
Of those tierce darts, Despair at me
doth throw :
make me in those civil wars to
cease !
1 will good tribute pay if thou do so.
Take tliou of me smooth pillows,
sweetest bed;
A chamber deaf to noise, and blind
to light ;
A rosy garland , and a weary head ;
And if these things, as being thine
by right.
Move not thy heavy grace, thou shalt
in me,
Livelier than elsewhere, Stella's im-
age see.
Lydia Huntley Sigourney.
FAREirELL OF THE SOUL TO THE
BODY.
Companion dear! the hour draws
nigh;
The sentence speeds — to die, to die.
So long in mystic union held,
So close with strong embrace com-
pelled.
How canst thou bear the dread de-
cree,
That strikes thy clasping nerves from
me?
To Him who on this mortal shore.
The same encircling vestment wore.
To Him 1 look, to Him I bend.
To Him thy shuddering frame com-
mend.
If I have ever caused thee pain,
The throbbing breast, the burning
brain.
With cares and vigils turned thee
pale.
And scorned thee when thy strength
did fail —
Forgive ! — Forgive! — thy task doth
cease.
Friend ! Lover ! — let us part in peace.
If thou didst sometimes check my
force.
Or, trifling, stay mine upward course,
Or lure from Heaven my wavering
trust,
Or bow my drooping wing to dust —
I blame thee not, the strife is done,
I knew thou wert the weaker one.
The vase of earth, the trembling clod,
Constrained to hold the breath of
God.
— Well hast thou in my service
wrought;
Thy brow liath mirrored forth my
thought.
To wear my smile thy lip hath glowed.
Thy tear, to speak my sorrows, flowed ;
Thine ear hath borne me rich sup-
plies
Of sweetly varied melodies ;
Thy hands my prompted deeds have
done,
Thy feet upon mine errands run ;
Yes, thou hast marked my bidding
well.
Faithful and true ! farewell, farewell !
Go to thy rest. A quiet bed
Meek mother Earth with flowers
shall spread.
'Wliere I no more thy sleep may break
With fevered dream, nor rudely wake
Thy wearied eye.
500
SIOOURNEY,
Oh, quit thy hold,
For thou art faint, and chill, and cold.
And long thy gasp and groan of pain
Have hound nie pitying in thy chain.
Though angels urge me hence to soar,
Where I shall share thine ills no more.
Yet we shall meet. To soothe thy
pain
Remember — we shall meet again.
Quell with this hope the victor's
sting.
And keep it as a signet-ring.
When the dire worm shall pierce thy
breast,
And nought but ashes mark thy rest,
When stars shall fall, and skies grow
dark,
And i^roud suns quench their glow-
worm spark.
Keep thou that hope, to light thy
gloom.
Till the last trumpet rends the tomb.
— Then shalt thou glorious rise, and
fair.
Nor spot, nor stain, nor wrinkle bear.
And I, with hovering wing elate,
The bursting of thy bonds shall wait.
And breathe the welcome of the sky —
'• No more to part, no more to die,
Co-heir of Immortality."
BENE VOLENCE.
Whose is the gold that glitters in the
mine ?
And whose the silver ? Are they not
the Lord's ?
And lo ! the cattle on a thousand hills.
And the broad earth with all her
gushing springs
Are they not His who made them ?
Ye who hold
Slight tenantry therein, and call your
lands
By your own names, and lock your
gathered gold
From him who in his bleeding Sa-
viour's nanie
Doth ask a part, whose shall those
riches be
When, like the grass-blade from the
autumn frost,
Ye fall away ?
Point out to me the forms
That in your treasure-chambers shall
enact
Glad mastership, and revel where
you toiled
Sleepless and stern. Strange faces
are they all.
O man! whose wrinkling labor is
for heirs
Thou knowest not who, thou in thy
mouldering bed,
Unkenned, vmchronicled of them,
shall sleep;
Nor will they thank thee, that thou
didst bereave
Thy soul of good for them.
Now, Vaow mayest give
The famished food, the prisoner
liberty.
Light to the darkened mind, to the
lost soul
A place in heaven. Take thou the
privilege
With solemn gratitude. Speck as
thou art
Upon earth's surface, gloriously exult
To be co-worker with the King of
kinafs.
THE CORAL INSECT.
Toil on! toil on! ye ephemeral train,
Who build on the tossing and treach-
erous main;
Toil on! for the wisdom of man ye
mock.
With your sand-based structures, and
domes of rock;
Your colunms the fathomless foun-
tains lave,
And your arches spring up through
the crested wave ;
Ye're a pvuiy race, thus boldly to rear
A fabric so vast, in a realm so drear.
Ye bind the deep with yoiu- secret
zone.
The ocean is sealed, and the surge a
stone:
Fresh wreaths from the coral pave-
ment spring.
Like the terraced pride of Assyria's
kins :
SIMMS.
501
The turf looks green where the break-
ers rolled,
O'er the Avhirlpool ripens the rind of
gold, [men.
The sea-snatched isle is the home of
And mountains exult where the wave
hath been.
But why do ye plant 'neath the bil-
lows dark
The wrecking reef for the gallant bark?
There are snares enough on the
tented field;
'Mid the blossomed sweets that the
valleys yield ;
There are serpents to coil ere the
flowers are up:
There's a poison drop in man's purest
cup ;
There are foes that watch for his cra-
dle breath,
And why need ye sow the floods with
death ?
With mouldering bones the deeps are
white,
From the ice-clad pole to the tropics
bright ;
The mermaid hath twisted her fingers
cold
AVith the mesh of the sea-boy's curls
of gold ;
And the gods of ocean have frowned
to see
The mariner's bed 'mid their halls of
glee;
Hath earth no graves ? that ye thus
must spread
The boundless sea with the throng-
ing dead ?
Ye build ! ye build ! bi;t ye enter not
in;
Like the tribes whom the desert de-
voured in their sin ;
From the land of promise, ye fade
and die.
Ere its verdure gleams forth on your
wearied eye.
As the cloud-crowned pyramids'
founders sleep
Noteless and lost in oblivion deep,
Ye slumber unmarked 'mid the deso-
late main,
While the wonder and pride of your
works remain.
William Gilmore Simms.
PROGRESS IX DENIAL.
*' Yet, onward still! " the spirit cries
within,
'Tis I that must repay thee. Mor-
tal fame.
If won, is but at best the hollow din.
The vulgar freedom with a mighty
name ;
Seek not this music, — ask not this
acclaim,
But in the strife find succor; — for
the toil
Pursued for such false barter ends
in shame.
As certainly as that which seeks but
spoil !
Best recompense he finds, who, to
his task
Brings a proud, patient spirit that
will wait,
Nor for the guerdon stoop, nor vainly
ask
Of fate or fortune, — but with right
good-will, [still.
Go, working on, and uncomplaining
Assured of fit reward, or soon or
late!
SOLACE OF THE WOODS.
Woods, waters, have a charm to
soothe the ear.
When common soimds have vexed
it. When the day
Grows sultry, and the crowd is in
thy way.
And working in thy soul much coil
and care, —
Betake thee to the forests. In the
shade
^^^^i^«^-
502
SIMMS.
Of pines, and by the side of purl-
ing sti'eams
That prattle all their secrets in
their dreams,
Unconscious of a listener, — unafraid;
Thy soul shall feel their freshening,
and the truth
Of nature then, reviving in thy
heart,
Shall bring thee the best feelings of
thy youth.
When in all natural joys thy joy
had part.
Ere lucre and the narrowing toils of
trade
Had turned thee to the thing thou
wast not made.
RECOMPENSE.
Not profitless the game, even when
we lose.
Nor wanting in reward the thank-
less toil;
The wild adventure that the man
pursues.
Requites him, though he gather not
the spoil :
Strength follows labor, and its exer-
cise
Brings independence, fearlessness
of ill,—
Courage and pride, — all attributes we
prize ; —
Though their fruits fail, not the
less precious still.
Though fame withholds the trophy of
desire,
And men deny, and the imxiatient
throng
Grow heedless, and the strains pro-
tracted, tire; —
Not wholly vain the minstrel and
the song.
If, striving to arouse one heavenly
tone
In others' hearts, it wakens up his
own.
And this, methinks, were no imseem-
ly boast.
In him who thus records the exije-
rience
Of one, the humblest of that erring
host.
Whose labors have been thought to
need defence.
What though he reap no honors, —
M'hat though death
Rise terrible between him and the
wreath,
That had been his reward, ere, in the
dust.
He too is dust ; yet hath he in his
heart.
The happiest consciousness of what
is just.
Sweet, true, and beautiful, — which
will not part [faith,
From his possession. In this happy
He knows that life is lovely, — that
all things
Are sacred ; — that the air is full of
wings
Bent heavenward, — and that bliss is
born of scath !
HEART ESSENTIAL TO GENIUS.
We are not always equal to our fate.
Nor true to our conditions. Doultt
and fear
Beset the bravest in their high
career.
At moments when the soul, no more
elate
With expectation, sinks beneath
the time.
The masters have their weakness.
" I would cliuib,"
Said Raleigh, gazing on the high-
est hill—
" But that I tremble with the fear to
fall!"
Apt was the answer of the high-
souled Queen, —
" If thy heart fail thee, never climb
ataU!"
The heart! if that be sound, confirms
the rest,
Crowns genius with his lion will
and mien.
And, from the conscious virtue in the
breast.
To trembling nature gives both
strength and will !
SIMMS.
503
FRIENDSHIP.
Though wronged, not harsh my an-
swer ! Love is fond,
Even pained, — and rather to his
injury bends,
Than cliooses to make shipwreck
of his friends
By stormy summons. He hath
naught beyond
For consolation, if tliat tliese be
lost;
And rather will he hear of fortune
crossed,
Plans baffled, hopes denied, — than
take a tone
Resentful, — with a quick and keen
reply
To hasty passion and impatient
eye.
Such as by noblest natures may be
shown.
When the mood vexes ! Friendship
is a seed
Needs tendance. You nuist keep it
free from weed,
Nor, if the tree has sometimes bitter
fruit,
Must you for this lay axe inito the
root.
UNHAPPY CHILDHOOD.
That season which all other men re-
gret,
And strive, with boyish longing, to
I'ecall,
Which love permits not memory to
forget.
And fancy still restores in dreams
of all
That boyhood worshipped, or be-
lieved, or knew, —
Brings no sweet images to me, — was
true,
Only in cold and cloud, in lonely
days
And gloomy fancies, — in defrauded
claims.
Defeated hopes, denied, denying
aims ; —
Cheered by no promise, — lighted by
no rays.
Warmed by no smile, — no mother's
smile, — that smile.
Of all, best suited sorrow to beguile,
And strengthen hope, and, by un-
marked degrees.
Encourage to their birth high pur-
poses.
MAXHOOD.
Manhood at last ! — and, with its
consciousness,
Are strength and freedom ; freedom
to pursue
The purposes of hope, — the godlike
bliss.
Born in the struggle for the great
and true!
And every energy that should be mine.
This day, I dedicate to its object, —
Life!
So help me. Heaven, that never I re-
sign
The duty which devotes me to the
strife ;
The enduring conflict which demands
my strength,
Whether of soul or body, to the
last;
The tribute of my years, through all
their length;
The future's compensation to the
past!
Boys' pleasures are for boyhood, — its
best cares
Befit us not in our performing years.
NIGHT-STORM.
This tempest sweeps the Atlantic ! —
Nevasink
Is howling to the capes I Grim Hat-
teras cries
Like thousand damned ghosts, that
on the brink
Lift their dark hands and threat
the thi-eatening skies;
Surging through foam and tempest,
old Roman
Hangs o'er the gulf, and, with his
cavernous throat.
Pours out the torrent of his wolfish
note,
504
SMITH.
And bids the billows bear it where
they can !
Beep calleth unto deep, and, from
the cloud,
Launches the bolt, that,' bursting
o'er the sea,
Kends for a moment the thick pitchy
shroud.
And shows the ship the shore be-
neath her lee :
Start not, dear wife, no dangers here
betide, —
And see, the boy still sleeping at
your side!
TRIUMPH.
The grave but ends the struggle!
Follows then
The trimnph, which, superior to
the doom,
Grows loveliest, and looks best, to
mortal men.
Purple in beauty, towering o'er the
tomb I
Oh ! with the stoppage of the impid-
sive tide
That vexed the impatient heart
with needful strife.
The soul that is hope's living,
leaps to life.
And shakes her fragrant plumage far
and wide!
Eyes follow then in worship which
but late
Frowned in defiance, — and the
timorous herd, [word,
That sleekly waited for another's
Grow bold, at last, to bring, — obey-
ing fate, —
The tribute of their praise, but late
denied, —
Tribute of homage which is some-
times, — hate!
Alexander Smith.
[From Norton.]
B ABB ABA.
On the Sabbath-day,
Through the church-yard old and gray.
Over the crisp and yellow leaves I held my rustling way;
And amid tlie words of mercy, falling on my soul like balms,
'Mid the gorgeous storms of music — in the mellow organ-calms,
'Mid the upward-streaming prayei's, and the rich and solemn psalms,
I stood careless, Barbara.
My heart was otherwhere
While the organ shook the air.
And the priest, with outspread hands, blessed the people with a prayer;
But, when rising to go homeward, with a mild and saint-like shine
Gleamed a face of airy beauty with its heavenly eyes on mine —
Gleamed and vanished in a moment — Oh, that face was surely thine
Out of heaven, Barbara !
O pallid, pallid face !
O earnest eyes of grace !
When last I saw thee, dearest,"it was in another place.
You came running forth to meet me with my love-gift on your wrist;
The flutter of a long white dress, then all was lost in mist —
A piu"ple stain of agony was on the mouth I kissed,
That wild morning, Barbara!
I searched, in my despair.
Sunny noon and midniglit air;
I coiild not drive away the thouglit that you were lingering there.
Oh, many and many a A\inter niglit I sat when you were gone,
My worn face buried in my hands, beside the fire alone.
Within the dripping church-yard, the rain plashing on your stone.
You were sleeping, Barbara !
'Mong angels, do you think
Of the precious golden link
I clasped around your happy arm while sitting by yon brink ?
Or when that niglit of gliding dance, of laughter and guitars,
Was emptied of its nuisic. and we watched, through latticed bars,
The silent midnight heaven creeping o'er us with its stars.
Till the day broke, 13arbara ?
In the years I've changed;
Wild and far my heart" hath ranged,
And many sins and errors now have been on "me avenged;
But to you I liave been faithful, whatsoever good I lacked:
I loved you, and above my life still hangs that love intact —
Your love the trembling rainbow, I the reckless cataract —
Still I love you, Barbara !
Yet, love, I am unblest;
With many doubts opprest,
I wander like a desert wind, without a place of rest.
Could I but win you for an hour from olf that starry shore,
The hunger of my soul were stilled, for Death hath told you more
Than the melancholy world doth know; things deeper than all lore.
You could teach me, Barbara !
In vain, in vain, in vain!
You will never come again!
There droops upon the dreary hills a mournful fringe of rain;
The gloaming closes slowly round, loud winds are in the tree,
Round selfish shores forever moans the hurt and Avounded sea,
There is no rest upon the earth, peace is with Death and thee,
Barbara !
GLASGOW.
Sing, poet, 'tis a merry world;
That cottage smoke is rolled and
curled
In sport, that every moss
Is happy, every inch of soil ; —
Before vie rims a road of toil
With my grave cut across.
Sing, trailing showers and breezy
downs —
I know the tragic hearts of towns.
City! I am true son of thine;
Ne'er dwelt I Avhere great mornings
shine
Around the bleating pens;
Ne'er by the rivulets I strayed,
And ne'er upon my childhood weighed
The silence of the glens.
Instead of shores where ocean
beats
I hear the ebb and flow of streets.
506
SMITH.
Black Labor draws his weary waves
Into their secret moaning caves;
But, with tlie morning light,
That sea again will overflow
With a long, weary sound of woe,
Again to faint in night.
Wave am I in that sea of woes,
Which, night and morning, ebbs and
flows.
I dwelt within a gloomy court.
Wherein did never sunbeam sport ;
Yet there my heart was stirred —
My very blood did dance and thrill,
A\' hen on my narrow window-sill
►Spring lighted like a bird.
Poor flowers! I watched them pine
for weeks,
With leaves as pale as human cheeks.
Afar, one summer, I was borne ;
Through golden vapors of the morn
I heard the hills of sheep :
I trod with a wild ecstasy
The bright fringe of the living sea :
And on a ruined keep
I sat, and watched an endless plain
Blacken beneath the gloom of rain.
Oh, fair the lightly-sprinkled waste.
O'er which a laughing shower has
raced !
Oh, fair the April shoots !
Oh, fair the woods on summer days,
While a blue hyacinthine haze
Is dreaming round the roots !
In thee, O city ! I discern
Another beauty, sad and stern.
Dra wthy fierce streams of blinding ore.
Smite on a thousand anvils, roar
Down to the harbor-bars ;
Smoulder in smoky sunsets, flare
On rainy nights ; with street and
square
Lie empty to the stars.
From terrace proud to alley base
I know thee as my mother's face.
When sunset bathes thee in his gold,
In wreaths of bronze thy sides are
rolled.
Thy smoke is dusky fire ;
And, from the glory round thee
pom-ed.
A sunbeam like an angel's sword
Shivers upon a spire.
Thus have I Matched thee, Terror!
Dream !
While the blue night crept up the
stream.
The wild train plunges in the hills,
He shrieks across the midnight rills;
Streams through tlie shifting glare,
The roar and flap of foundry tires,
That shake with light the sleeping
shires ;
And on the moorlands bare
He sees afar a crown of light
Hang o'er thee in the hollow night.
At midnight, when thy suburbs lie
As silent as a noonday sky
When larks with heat are mute,
I love to linger on thy bridge.
All lonely as a mountain ridge.
Disturbed but by my foot;
While the black lazy stream beneath
Steals from its far-off wilds of heath.
And through thy heart as through a
dream.
Flows on that black disdainful
' stream;
All scornfully it flows.
Between the huddled gloom of masts,
Silent as pines unvexed by blasts —
'Tween lamps in streaming rows,
O wondrous sight! O stream of
dread !
long, dark river of the dead !
Afar, the banner of the year
Unfurls : but dimly prisoned here,
'Tis only when I greet
A dropt rose lying in my way,
A butterfly that llutters gay
Athwart the noisy street.
1 know the happy Summer smiles
Aroimd thy suburbs, miles on miles.
'Twere neither ptean now, nor dirge,
The flash and thunder of the surge
On flat sands wide and bare ;
No haunting joy or anguish dwells
In the green light of sunny dells.
Or in the starry air.
Alike to me the desert flower.
The rainbow laughingo'er theshower.
SMITH.
507
AVhile o'erthy walls the darknesssails,
I lean against the churchyard rails ;
Up in the midnight towers
The helfried sj^ire, the street is dead,
I hear in silence overliead
The clang of iron hovn's :
It moves me not — I know her tomb
Is yonder in the shapeless gloom.
All raptures of this mortal breath,
Solemnities of life and death,
Dwell in thy noise alone :
Of me thou hast become a part —
Some kindred with my human heart
Lives in thy streets of stone;
For we have been familiar more
Than galley-slave and weary oar.
The beech is dipped in Avine; the
shower
Is burnished ; on the swinging flower
The latest bee doth sit
The low sun stares through dust of
gold.
And o'er the darkening heath and
wold
The large ghost-moth doth flit.
In every orchard Autumn stands,
With apples in his golden hands.
But all these sights and sounds are
strange ;
Then wherefore from thee should I
range ?
Thou hast my kith and kin ;
My childhood, youth, and manhood
brave ;
Thou hast that unforgotten grave
Within thy central din.
A sacredness of love and death
Dwells in thy noise and smoky
breath.
Charlotte Smith.
THE CRICKET.
Little inmate, full of mirth.
Chirping on my humble hearth;
Wheresoe'er be thine abode.
Always harbinger of good.
Pay me for thy warm retreat
With a song most soft and sweet;
In return thou shalt receive
Such a song as I can give.
Tliough in voice and shape they be
Formed as if akin to thee,
Thou sin-passest, happier far,
Happiest grasshoppers that are;
Theirs is but a summer-song,
Tliine endures the winter long.
Unimpaired, and shrill, and clear.
Melody throughout the year.
Neither night nor dawn of day
Puts a period to thy lay :
Then, insect ! let thy simple song
Cheer the Avinter evening long;
While, secm"e from every storm.
In my cottage stout and warm.
Thou shalt my merry minstrel be,
And I" 11 delight to shelter thee.
THE CLOSE OF SPRING.
The garlands fade that Spring so
lately wove,
Each simple flower which she had
nursed in dew,
Anemones that spangled every grove,
The primrose wan, and harebell
mildly blue.
No more shall violets linger in the
dell,
Or purple orchis variegate the
l^lain.
Till Spring again shall call forth ev(>ry
bell,
And dress with humid hands her
wreaths again.
Ah! poor humanity! so frail, so
fair.
Are the fond visions of thy early
day,
Till tyrant passion and corrosive
care
Bid all thy fairy colors fade awaj'!
Another May new biuls and flowers
shall bring;
Ah! why has Happiness no second
Spring ?
508
SMITH.
Florence Smith.
{From liainbow-Sovgs.]
THE PURPLE OF THE POET.
I
Purple, the passionate color!
Purple, the color of pain !
I clothe myself in the rapture —
I count the suffering gain !
The sea lies gleaming before me.
Pale in the smile of the sun —
No shadow — all golden and azure —
The joy of the day has begiui !
Throbbing and yearning forever.
With longing unsatisfied, sweet —
Flushed with the pain and the raptm-e,
Warm at the sun-god's feet —
In the glow and gloom of the evening
The glory is reached — and o'er-
past ;
Joy's rose-bloom has ripened to pur-
ple —
'Twill fade, but the stars shine at
last!
Purple, the passionate color!
Robing the martyr, the king —
Regal in joy and in anguish, '
Life's blossom ; with, ah! its
sting —
Give me the sovereign color —
I'll suffer that I may reign!
The poet's moment of ra^iture
Is worth the poet's jmin!
[ From Pain how-Songs.]
THE YELLOW OF THE MISER.
The beautiful color — the color of
gold !
How it sparkles and burns in the
piled-up dust!
The poets ! they know not, they never
have told
Of the fadeless color, the color of
gold —
Of my god in whom I trust !
Deep down in the earth it winds
and it creeps —
In her sluggish old veins 'tis the warm
rich blood —
The old mother-monster ! how soimd-
ly she sleeps !
Come! nearest her heart, where the
strong life leaps —
We drink, we bathe in the flood !
Ah, the far-off days! was I ever a
child ?
— My brain is so dark, and my heart
has grown cold.
Those fields where the golden-eyed
buttercups smiled
Long ago — did I love them with
heart undefiled '?
Did I seek the flowers for the
gold ?
Be still ! O thou traitor Remorse,
at my heart.
Whining without in the dark at the
door —
I know thee, the beggar and thief
that thou art,
Lying low at my threshold — I bid
thee depart!
Thou shalt dog my footsteps no
more.
Wilt thou bring me i\\o faded flow-
ers of my youth —
With hands full of dead leaves, and
lips full of lies —
For these shall I yield thee my treas-
ure, in sooth ?
Are the buttercup's petals pure gold,
say truth!
Wilt thou coin me the daisy's
eyes ? -
I hate them ! the smiling flowers in
the sun,
And the yellow, smooth rays that
they feed on at noon —
Tis the hard cold gold I will have or
none !
Come, pluck me the stars down, one
by one,
Plant me the pale rich moon !
Ah ! the mystical seed, it has grown,
it has spread !
— But the sharp star-points tliey are
piercing my brow,
And tlie rosy home-faces grow hvid
and dead
In the terrible color the fire-blossoms
shed —
I am reaping my harvest in now !
The horrible color — the color of
flame !
The hot sun has o'erflowed from his
broken urn —
O thou pitiless sky ! wilt thou show
me my shame ?
While the cursed gold clings to my
fingers like flame —
And glitters only to burn !
SOMEBODY OLDER.
How pleasant it is that always
There's somebody older than you —
Some one to pet and caress you,
Some one to scold you too !
Some one to call you a baby,
To laugh at you when you're wise;
Some one to care when you're sorry.
To kiss the tears from your eyes.
When life has begun to be weary.
And youth to melt like the dew.
To know, like the little children.
Somebody's older than you!
The path cannot be so lonely,
For some one has trod it before ;
The golden gates are the nearer.
That some one stands at the door !
— I can think of nothing sadder
Than to feel, when days are few,
There's nobody left to lean on,
Nobody older than you !
The younger ones may be tender
To the feeble steps and slow ;
But they can't talk the old times
over —
Alas ! how should they know !
'Tisa romance to them — a wonder
You were ever a child at play;
But the dear ones waiting in Heaven
Know it is all as you say.
I know that the great All-Father
Loves us and the little ones too ;
Keep only child-like hearted —
Heaven is older than you!
UNUEQUITING.
I CANNOT love thee, but I hold thee
dear —
Thou must not stay — I cannot bid
thee go !
I am so lonely, and the end draws
near —
Ah, love me still, but do not tell
me so !
'Tis but a little longer — keep thy
faith !
Though love's last rapture I shall
never know,
I fain would trust thee even unto
death ;
Ah, love me still, but do not tell
me so !
I am so poor I have no self to give.
And less than all I will not offer,
no!
I die, but not for thee — fain would
I live —
Ay! love me still, but do not tell
me so !
Like a strange flower that blossoms
in the night.
And dies at dawn, love faded long
ago —
Born in a dream it perished with the
light —
Lov'st thou me still ? Ah, do not
tell me so !
Let me imagine that thou art my
friend —
No less — no more I ask for here
below !
Be patient with me even to the end —
Loving me still, thou wilt not tell
me so!
510
SMITE.
Those words were sweet once — never
more a2;ain
— I thought my dream had van-
ished, let it go!
I dreamed of joy — 1 woke, it turned
to pahi — [so !
All, love me still, but never tell me
I cannot lose thee yet, so near to
heaven !
There with diviner love all souls
shall glow;
There is no marriage bond, no vows
are given —
Thou'lt love me still, nor need to
tell me so !
Ah! I am selfish, asking even this —
I cannot love thee, nor yet bid thee
go!
To utter love is nigh love's dearest
bliss —
Thou lov'st me still, and dost not
tell me so!
Horace Smith.
HYMN TO THE FLOWERS.
Day-stars ! that ope your eyes with
morn to twinkle
From rainbow galaxies of earth's
creation,
And dew-drops on her lonely altars
sprinkle
As a libation!
Ye matin worshippers ! who bending
lowly
Before the uprisen sun — God's
lidless eye — [holy
Throw from your chalices a sweet and
Incense on liigh!
Ye briglit mosaics ! that with storied
beauty
The floor of Nature's temple tes-
sellate,
What numerous emblems of instruc-
tive duty
Your forms create !
'Neath cloistered boughs, each floral
bell that swingeth
And tolls its perfume on the pass-
ing air,
Makes sabbath in the fields, and ever
ringeth
A call to prayer.
Not to the domes wliere crumbling
arch and column
Attest the feebleness of mortal
hand,
But to that fane, most catholic and
solemn,
Whicli God hath planned ;
To that catliedral, boundless as our
wonder.
Whose quenchless lamps the sun
and moon supply —
Its choir, the winds and waves ; its
organ, tlimider ;
Its dome the sky.
There — as in solitude and shade I
Avander
Through the green aisles, or,
stretched upon the sod.
Awed by the silence, reverently pon-
der
The ways of God —
Your voiceless lips, O flowers, are
living preachers,
Each cup a pulpit, and each leaf a
book.
Supplying to my fancy, numerous
teachers
From loneliest nook.
Floral apostles! that in deAAy sjilen-
dor
"Weep without Avoe, and blush
witliout a crime,"
O may I deeply learn, and ne'er sur-
render,
Your lore sublime!
SMITH.
511
" Thou wert not. Solomon! in all thy
glory.
Arrayed,'" the lilies cry, "in robes
like oiu's ;
How vain your grandeur! Ah, how
transitory
Are human flowers !' '
In the sweet-scented pictures, Heav-
enly Artist!
With which thou paintest Nature's
wide-spread hall,
What a delightful lesson thou im-
partest
Of love to all.
Not useless are ye, flowers! though
made for pleasure:
Blooming o'er field and wave, by
day and night.
From every source your sanction bids
me treasure
Harmless delight.
Ephemeral sages! what instructors
hoary
For such a world of thought could
furnish scope ?
Each fading calyx a ineihento niori,
Yet fount of hope.
Posthumous glories! angel-like col-
lection !
Upraised from seed or bulb interred
in earth.
Ye are to me a type of resurrection.
And second birth.
Were I. O God. in churchless lands
remaining.
Far from all voice of teachers or
divines.
My soul would find in flowers of thy
ordaining.
Priests, sermons, shrines!
ADDRESS TO A MUMMY.
And thou hast walked about, (how
strange a stoiy!)
In Thebes's streets three thousand
years ago,
When the Memnonium was in all its
glory.
And Time had not begun to over-
throw
Those temples, palaces, and piles
stupendous.
Of which the very ruins are tremen-
dous.
Speak! for thou long enough hast
acted dummy ;
Thou hast a tongue — come — let
us hear its tune ;
Thou'rt standing on thy legs, above
ground, mummy!
Kevisiting the glimpses of the
moon —
Not like thin ghosts or disembodied
creatures.
But with thy bones, and flesh, and
limbs, and featui'es.
Tell us — for doubtless thou canst
recollect —
To whom should we assign the
Sphinx's fame ?
Was Cheops or Cephrenes architect
Of either Pyramid that bears his
name ?
Is Pompey's Pillar really a misnomer?
Had Thebes a hundred gates, as sung
by Homer ?
Perhaps thou wert a mason, and for-
bidden
By oath to tell the secret of thy
trade —
Then say what secret melody was
hidden
In Memnon's statue, which at sun-
rise played ;
Perhaps thou wert a priest — if so.
my struggles
Are vain, for priestcraft never owns
its juggles.
Perhaps that very hand, now pin-
ioned flat.
Has hob-a-nobbed with Pharaoh,
glass to glass;
Or dropped a half -penny in Homer's
hat;
Or doffed thine own, to let Queen
Dido pass;
512
SMITH.
Or held, by Solomon's own invitation,
A torch at the great Temple's dedica-
tion.
I need not ask thee if that hand,
when armed,
Has any Roman soldier mauled and
knuckled ;
For thou wert dead, and buried, and
embalmed,
Ere Ivomulus and Remus had been
suckled ;
Antiquity appears to have begun
Long after thy primeval race was run.
Thou could' st develop — if that with-
ered tongue
Might tell us what those sightless
orbs have seen —
How the world looked when it was
fresh and young,
And the great Deluge still had left
it green; Ipages
Or was it then so old that history's
Contained no record of its early ages ?
Still silent, incomnuuiicative elf!
Art swoi'n to secrecy ? then keep
thy vows ;
But prythee tell vis something of
thyself —
Reveal the secrets of thy prison-
house ;
Since in the world of spirits thou
hast slumbered —
What hast thou seen — ^what strange
adventures numbered ?
Since first thy form was in this box
extended
We have, above ground, seen some
strange mutations ;
The Roman empire has begun and
ended —
New worlds have risen — Ave have
lost old nations;
And countless kings have into dust
been humbled.
While not a fragment of thy flesh has
crumbled.
Didst thou not hear the pother o'er
thy head.
When the great Persian conqueror,
Cambyses,
Marched armies o'er thy tomb with
thundering tread —
O'erthrew Osiris, Orus, Apis,
Isis;
And shook the Pyramids with fear
and wonder.
When the gigantic Memnon fell
asunder ?
If the tomb's secrets may not be con-
fessed.
The nature of thy private life un-
fold:
A heart has throbbed beneath that
leathern breast,
And tears adown that dusky cheek
have rolled ;
Have children climbed those knees
and kissed that face ;
What was thy name and station, age
and race ?
Statue of flesh! Immortal of the
dead !
Imperishable type of evanescence !
Posthumous man, who quit' st thy
narrow bed.
And standest undecayed within our
presence !
Thou wilt hear nothing till the Judg-
ment morning,
When the great trump shall thrill
thee \\ith its warning.
Why should this worthless tegument
endure,
If its undying guest be lost for-
ever ?
Oh! let us keep the soul embalmed
and pure
In living virtue— that when both
must sever.
Although corruption may our frame
consume.
The immortal spirit in the skies may
bloom !
SMITH.
513
May Riley Smith.
IF.
If, sitting with this Httle worn-out
shoe
And scarlet stocking lying on niy
knee,
I knew his little feet had pattered
through
The pearl-set gates that lie 'twixt
heaven and nie,
I should be reconciled and happy too,
And look with glad eyes toward the
jasper sea.
If, in the morning, when the song of
birds.
Reminds me of lost music far more
sweet,
I listened for his pretty broken words.
And for the nuisic of his dimpled
feet,
I could be almost happy, though I
heard
No answer, and I saw his vacant
seat.
I could be glad if, when the day is
done,
And all its cares and heart-aches
laid away, [sun,
I couUl look westward to the hidden
And. with a heart full of sweet
yearnings, say —
" To-night I'm nearer to my little one
By just the travel of a single day."
If he were dead, I should not sit to-
day
And stain with tears the wee sock
on my knee;
I should not kiss the tiny shoe and say,
" Bring back again my little boy
to me ! ' '
I should be patient, knowing it was
God's way.
And wait to meet him o'er death's
silent sea.
But oh ! to know the feet, once pure
and white,
The haunts of vice have boldly ven-
tured in I
The hands that shoidd have battled
for the right
Have been wrung crimson in the
clasp of sin !
And should he knock at Heaven's
gate to-night,
I fear my boy could hardly enter in.
SOMETIME.
Sometime, when all life's lessons
have been learned.
And sun and stars forevermore
have set.
The things which oin- weak judg-
ments here have spurned,
The things o'er which we grieved
with lashes wet,
Will flash before us out of life's dark
night.
As stars shine most in deeper tints
of blue;
And we shall see how all God's plans
are right.
And how what seemed reproof was
love most true.
And we shall see how, while we
frown and sigh,
God's plans go on as best for you
and me;
How, when we called. He heeded not
our cry.
Because His wisdom to' the end
could see.
And e'en as prudent parents disallow
Too much of sweet to craving baby-
hood,
So God, perhaps, is keeping from us
now
Life's sweetest things, because it
seemeth good.
And if, sometimes, commingled with
life's wine.
We find the wormwood, and rebel
and shrink.
Be sure a wiser hand than yours or
mine
Pours out the potion for our lips to
drink;
514
SOU THEY.
And if some friend we love is lying
low.
Where human kisses cannot reach his
face.
Oh, do not hlame the loving Father so,
But wear your sorrow with obe-
dient grace!
And you shall shortly know that
lengthened breath
Is not tiie sweetest gift God sends
His friend,
And that, sometimes, the sable pall
of death
Conceals the fairest boon His love
can send. [life.
If we could push ajar the gates of
And stand within and all God's
workings see.
We could interpret all this doubt and
strife [key.
And for each mystery could find a
But not to-day. Then be content,
poor heart; ,
God's plans like lilies ])ure and
white luifold;
We must not tear the close-shut
leaves apart, [gold.
Time will reveal the calyxes of
And if, through patient toil, Ave
reach the land
Whei'e tired feet, with sandals
loosed, may rest.
When we shall clearly know and
understand,
1 think that we shall say, " (iod
knew the best! "
Caroline Bowles Southey.
LAUXCn THY HARK, MAUI MCI!.
Launch thy bark, mariner!
Christian, God speed thee:
Let loose the rudder bands.
Good angels lead thee !
Set thy sails warily,
Tem))ests will come ;
Steer thy course steadily.
Christian, steer home!
Look to the weather bow.
Breakers are round thee :
Let fall the plunnnet now.
Shallows may ground thee.
Reef in the foresail, there !
Hold the helm fast!
So — let the vessel wear, —
There swept the blast.
What of the night, watchman '?
What of the night ?
'"Cloudy, all quiet, —
No land yet, — all's riijht."
Be wakeful, be vigilant. —
Danger may be
7^t an hour wlien all seemeth
Seciu'est to thee.
How ! gains the leak so fast ?
Clear out the hold, —
Hoist up thy merchandise,
Heave out thy gold ;
There, let the ingots go; —
Now the ship riglits;
Hurrah! the harbor's near, -
Lol the red lights.
Slacken not sail yet
At inlet or island;
Straight for the beacon steer,
Straight for the high land;
Crowd all thy canvas on.
Cut through the foam : —
Christian! cast anchor now, ■
Heaven is tliy home!
THE PAUPER'S DEATH-RED.
Ti;eai) softly! bow the head —
In revei'ent silence bow !
No passing bell doth toll;
Yet an immortal soul
Is passing now.
Stranger, however great.
With lowly reverence bow!
There's one in that poor shed —
One by that paltry bed —
Greater than thou.
SOUTHS Y
515
Beneath that beggar's roof,
Lo ! Death doth keep his state !
Enter! — no crowds attend —
Enter! — no guards defend
This palace gate.
Tliat pavement damp and cold
No smiling courtiers tread ;
One silent woman stands.
Lifting with meagre hands
A dying head.
No mingling voices sound —
An infant wail alone;
A sob sujipressed — again
That short deep gas]) — and then
The parting groan !
O change ! — O wondrous change !
Uurst are the prison bars!
This moment there, so low,
So agonized — and now
Beyond the stars !
O change ! — stupendous change !
There lies the soulless clod !
The sun eternal breaks;
The new immortal wakes —
Wakes with his C4od.
/ NEVER CAST A ELOWER AWAY.
I NEVER cast a flower away, '
The gift of one who cared for me —
A little flower — a faded flower —
But it was done reluctantly.
I never looked a last adieu
To things familiar, but my heart
Shrank with a feeling almost pain
Even from their lifeleSsness to part.
1 never spoke the word " Farewell,"'
But with an utterance faint and
broken ;
An earth-sick longing for the time
When it shall nevermore be spoken,
Robert Southey.
[From Thalabn.]
A'A TERE'S QUEST/OX AXD FAITH'S
ANS WER.
Alas! the setting sun
Saw Zeinab in her bliss,
Hodeirah's wife beloved.
Alas ! the wife beloved.
The fruitful mother late.
Whom when the daughters of Arabia
named.
They wished their lot like hers, —
She Avanders o'er the desert sands
A wretched widow now;
The fruitful mother of so fair a race.
With only one preserved.
She wanders o'er the wilderness.
No tear relieved the burden of
her heart;
Stunned with the heavy woe, she
felt like one.
Half -wakened from a midnight dream
of blood.
But sometimes, when the boy
Would wet her hand with tears.
And, looking up to her fixed coun-
tenance.
Sob out the name of mother! then
she groaned.
At length collecting, Zeinab turned
her eyes
To heaven, and praised the Lord:
" He gave, he takes away! "
The pious sufferer cried ;
" The Lord our God is good ! "
" Good, is he ?'' quoth the boy:
"Why are my brethren and :iiy sis-
ters slain ?
Why is my father killed ?
Did ever we neglect our prayers,
Or ever lift a hand unclean to
Heaven ?
Did ever stranger from our tent
Unwelcomed turn away ?
Mother, He is not good!"
Then Zeinab beat her breast in
agony, —
" O God, forgive the child I
51G
SOU THEY
He knows not what he says ;
The hand that wisely woxmded it.
Thou know'st I did not teach him
Repine not, my son !
thoughts like these;
In wisdom and in mercy Heaven
O Pi'opliet, pardon him! "
inflicts
Its painful remedies."
Slie had not wept till that assuag-
ing prayer ;
The fountains of her grief were
opened then.
[From Thalaba.]
And tears relieved her heart.
THE TWOFOLD POWER OF ALL
She raised her swimming eyes to
THINGS.
heaven, —
" Allah I thy will be done!
All things have a double power,
Beneath the dispensations of that
Alike for good and evil. The same
will
fire.
I groan, but nuirmur not.
That on the comfortable hearth
A day" will come when all things
at eve
that are dark
Warmed the good man, flames o'er
Will be made clear: then sliall I
the house at night:
know, Lord !
Should we for this forego
Why, in thy mercy, thou hast
Tlie needful element ?
stricken me ;
Because the scorching summer
Then see and understand what
sun
now
My heart believes and feels."
Darts fever, woiddst thou quench the
orb of day ?
Or deemest thou that Heaven in
anger formed
Iron to till the field, because,
[From Thalaba.]
when man
REMEDIAL tiUFFElilNG.
Had tipt his arrows for the chase,
he rushed
A murderer to the war '?
" Repine not, O my son!" the old
man replied.
" That Heaven hath chastened thee.
Behold this vine:
I found it a wild tree, whose wan-
[From Thafaha.]
ton strength
NIGHT.
Had swoln into irregular twigs.
And bold excrescences,
How beautiful is night !
And spent itself in leaves and lit-
A dewy freshness fills" the silent
tle rings;
air;
So, in the floin-ish of its out-
No mist obscures, nor cloud nor speck
wardness.
nor stain
AVasting the sap and strength
Breaks the serene of heaven;
That should liave given forth
In full-orbed glory yonder moon
fruit.
divine
But when I pruned the plant.
Rolls through the dark blue
Then it grew temperate in its
depths.
vain expense
Beneath her steady ray
Of useless leaves, and knotted, as
The desert-circle spreads.
thou seest.
Like the romid ocean, girdled with
Into these full, clear clusters, to
the sky.
repay
How beautiful is night!
SOUTHEY.
511
[From The Cume of Keliamn.]
LOVE'S IMMORTALITY.
TiiEY sill who tell us love can die.
With life all other passions tiy.
All others are but vanity.
In heaven, Ambition cannot dwell,
Nor Avarice in the vaults of hell;
Earthly, these passions of the earth
They perish where tliev had their
birth.
But Love is indestructible.
Its holy flaine forever burnetii.
From heaven it came, to heaven re-
turneth.
Too oft on earth a troubled guest.
At times deceived, at times oppressed,
It here is tried and puritied.
Then hath in heaven its perfect rest;
It sowetli here with toil and care,
But the harvest-time of Love is there.
Oh ! when a mother meets on high
The babe she lost in infancy.
Hath she not then, for pains and
fears.
The day of woe, the watchful night,
For all her sorrows, all her tears,
An over-ioayment of delight I
THE OLD MAX'S COMFORTS. AND
HOW HE GAINED THEM.
You are old. Father William, the
young man cried.
The few locks that are left you are
gray :
You ai'c hale. Father W'illiam, a
hearty old man,
Now tell me the reason, I pray.
In the days of my youth, Father Wil-
liam replied,
I remembered that youth would fly
fast,
And abused not my health and my
vigor at first.
That i never might need them at
last.
You are old, Father William, the
young man cried.
And pleasures with youth pass
away.
And yet you lament not the days that
are gone.
Now tell me the reason, 1 pray.
In the days of my youth. Father Wil-
liam replied,
I remembered that youth could not
last ;
I thought of the future, whatever I
did.
That I never might grieve for the
past.
You are old. Father William, the
young man cried.
And life must be hastening away :
You are cheerful, and love to con-
verse upon death !
Now tell me the reason, I pray.
I am cheerful, young man. Father
William replied ;
Let the cause thy attention engage ;
In the days of my youth I remem-
bered my God !
And he hath not forgotten mv age.
[ From Joan of Arc.']
THE MAID OF ORLEANS GIRDING
FOR BATTLE.
Sc'AKCE had the earliest ray from
Chinon's towers
Made visible the mists that curled
along
The winding waves of Yienne, when
from her couch
Started the martial maid. She
mailed her limbs:
The white plumes nodded o'er her
helmed head;
She girt the sacred falchion by her
side.
And, like some youth that from his
mother's arms.
For his first field impatient, breaks
away.
Poising the lance Avent forth.
Twelve hundred men,
Bearing in ordered ranks their well-
sharped spears,
518
SOU THEY.
Await her coming. Terrible in arms,
Before tlicm towered Dmiois, his
manly face
Dark-shadowed by the helmet's iron
cheeks.
The assembled covirt gazed on the
marshalled train,
And at the gate the aged prelate stood
To pour his blessing on the chosen
host.
And now a soft and solemn sym-
phony
Was heard," and chanting high the
hallowed hynni,
From the near convent came the ves-
tal maids.
A holy banner, woven by virgin
hands.
Snow-white, they bore. A mingled
sentiment
Of awe, and eager ardor for the
fiilht.
Thrilled" through the troops, as he,
the reverend man
Took the white standard, and with
heavenward eye
Called on the C4od of .Justice, bless-
ing; it.
The maid, her brows in reverence
unhelmed.
Her dark hair floating on the morn-
ing gale.
Knelt to" iiis prayer, and stretching
forth her hand,
Received the mystic ensign. From
the host
A loud and universal shout burst
forth.
As rising from the ground, on her
white brow
Slie placed the plumed casque, and
waved on high
The bannered lilies.
THE HOLLY-TnEE.
O READKii! hast thou ever stood to
see
The holly-tree?
The eye that contemplates it well
perceives
Its glossy leaves
Ordered by an intelligence so wise
As might confound the atheist's
sophistries.
Below, a circling fence, its leaves are
seen
Wrinkled and keen.
No grazing cattle through their
prickly round
Can reach to wound ;
But as they grow where nothing is
to fear.
Smooth and unarmed the pointless
leaves appear.
I love to view these things with cu-
rious eyes.
And moralize;
And in the wisdom of the holly-tree
Can emblems see
Wlierewith perchance to make a
pleasant rhyme.
Such as may profit in the after-time.
So, though abroad perchance I might
appear
Harsh and austere.
To those who on my leisure would in-
trude
Reserved and rude ;
Gentle at home amid my friends I'd
be.
Like the high leaves upon the holly-
tree.
And should my youth, as youth is apt,
I know.
Some harshness show.
All vain asperities, I day by day
Would wear away.
Till the smooth temper of my age
should be
Like the high leaves upon the holly-
tree.
And as when all the summer trees
are seen
So bright and green
The holly' leaves their fadeless hues
display
Less bridit than they.
But when the bare and wintry woods
we see.
What then so cheerful as the holly-
tree ?
sou THEY.
519
So serious should my youth appear
among
The thoughtless throng ;
So would I seem au;id the young and
gay
More grave than they.
That in my age as cheerful I might be
As the green winter of the holly-tree.
THE PAUPER'S FUXEHAL.
AViiat! and not one to heave the
l^ious sigh '?
Not one whose sorrow-swollen and
aching eye
For social scenes, for life's endear-
ments fled.
Shall drop a tear and dwell upon the
dead !
Poor wretched outcast! I will weep
for thee.
And sorrow for forlorn humanity.
Yes. I will weep; but not that thou
art come
To the stern sabbath of the silent
tomb :
For squalid want, and the black scor-
pion care,
Heart-withering fiends I shall never
enter there.
I sorrow for the ills thy life hath
known,
As through the world's long pilgrim-
age, alone.
Haunted by poverty, and M'oebegone.
Unloved, unfriended, thou didst jour-
ney on :
Thy youth in ignorance and labor
past.
And thine old age all barrenness and
blast.
Hard was thy fate, wdiicli, while it
doomed to woe.
Denied thee wisdom to support tlie
blow ;
And robbed of all its energy thy mind.
Ere yet it cast tliee on thy fellow-
kind.
Abject of thought, the victim of dis-
tress,
To wander in the world's wide wilder-
ness.
Poor outcast, sleep in peace! the win-
try storm
Blows bieak no more on thy unshel-
tered form;
Thy woes are past; thou restest in
the tond); —
I i^ause, and ponder on the days to
come.
WniTTEX^ ON SUNDAY MORNING.
Go thou and seek the house of
prayer !
I to the w^oodlands wend, and there
In lovely nature see the God of love.
The swelling organ's peal
Wakes not my soul to zeal,
Like the wild music of the wind-
swept grove.
The gorgeous altar and the mystic
vest
Rouse not such ai'dor in my breast.
As where the noon-tide beam
Flashed from the brolven stream,
Quick vibrates on the dazzled sight;
Or where the cloud-suspended rain
Sweeps in shadows o'er the plain";
Or when reclining on the cliff's huge
height,
I mark the billows burst in silver
light.
Go thou and seek the house of
prayer
I to the woodlands shall repair.
Feed with all nature's charms mine
eyes.
And hear all nature's melodies.
The primrose bank shall there dis-
pense
Faint fragrance to the awaken(>d
sense :
The morning beams that life and
joy impart.
Shall with their influence warm my
heart,
And the full tear that down my
cheek will steal.
Shall speak the prayer of praise I
feel.
Go thou and seek the hous,' of
prayer !
I to the woodlands bend my way
And meet Keligion there.
She needs not haunt the high-arched
dome to pray
Where storied windows dim the
doubtful day.
AVith Liberty she loves to rove,
Wide o'er the heathy hill or cow-
slipt dale;
Or seek the shelter of the embower-
ing grove,
Or with the streamlet wind along
the vale.
Sweet are these scenes to her; and
when the night
Pours in the north her silver streams
of light, .
She woos reflection in the silent
gloom,
And ponders on the world to come.
THE BATTLE OF BLENHEIM.
It was a summer evening.
Old Kaspar's work was done;
And he before his cottage door
AVas sitting in the sun,
And by him sported on the green
His little grandchild AVilhehnine.
She saw her brother Peterkin
Iioll something large and round,
That he beside the rivulet
In playing there, had found;
He came to ask what he had found,
That was so large, and smooth, and
round.
Old Kaspar took it from the boy,
AVho stood expectant by :
And then the old man shook his head,
AikI with a natural sigh,
'Tis some poor fellow's skull, said he,
AVho fell in the great victory.
I find them in the garden, for
There's many hereabout.
And often when I go to plough.
The ploughshare turns them out;
For many thousand men, said he,
AVere slain in the great victory.
Now tell us what 'twas all about,
Young Peterkin he cries.
And little Wilhelmine looks up
AA''ith wonder-waiting eyes;
Now tell us all about the war.
And what they killed each other for.
It was the English, Kaspar cried.
That put the Fi-ench to rout;
But what they killed each other for,
1 could not well make out.
But everybody said, quoth he,
That 'twas a famous victory.
My father lived at Blenheim then.
Yon little stream hard by.
They burnt his dwelling to the
ground.
And he was forced to fly;
So with his wife and child lie fled.
Nor had he where to rest his head.
AA^ith fire and sword the country
round
AA^as wasted far and wide,
And many a chikling mother then.
And new-born infant, died :
But things like that, you know, nuist
be
At every famous victory.
They say it was a shocking sight.
After the field was won.
For many thousand liodies here
Lay rotting in the sun ;
But things like that, you know, must
be"
After a famous victory.
Great praise the Duke of Marlbro'
won.
And our good Prince Eugene.
AA'liy. 'twas a very kicked thing!
Said little AV'ilhelmine.
Nay — nay — my little girl, quoth he,
It was a famous victory.
And everybody praised the Duke
AA^ho such a fight did win.
But what good came of it at last ?
Quoth little Peterkin.
AA'hy, that I cannot tell, said he,
But 'twas a famous victory.
THE CATARACT OF LODOllE.
" How does the water
Come down at Lodore!'"
My little boy asked me
Thus, once on a time ;
And moreover he tasked me
To tell him in rhyme.
Anon, at the word;
There first came one daughter,
And then came anotlier.
To second and third
The request of their brother;
And to hear how the water
Comes down at Lodore,
AVith its rush and its roar,
As many a time
They had seen it before.
So 1 told them in rhyme.
For of rhymes I had store ;
And 'twas in my vocation
For tlieir recreation
That so I should sing;
Because I was laureate
To them and the kinir.
From its sources which well
In the tarn on the fell ;
From its fountains
In the mountains.
Its rills and its gills;
Through moss and through brake,
It runs and it creeps
For a while, till it sleeps
In its own little lake.
And thence at departing.
Awakening and starting.
It runs through the reeds,
And away it proceeds,
Through meadow and glade,
In sun and in shade.
And through the wood-shelter.
Among crags in its flurry.
Helter-skelter,
Ilurry-skuny,
Here it comes sparkling.
And there it lies darkling;
Now smoking and frothing
Its tumult and wrath in,
Till, in this rapid race
On which it is bent.
It reaches the place
Of its steep descent.
The cataract strong
Then plunges along.
Striking and raging
As if a war waging
Its caverns and rocks among;
Rising and leaping.
Sinking and creeping.
Swelling and sweeping.
Showering and springing,
Flying and flinging.
Writhing and ringing.
Eddying and whisking.
Spouting and frisking.
Turning and twisting,
Aroimd and around
Witli endless rebound :
Smiting and fighting
A sight to delight in ;
Confounding, astounding.
Dizzying and deafening the ear with
its sound.
Collecting, projecting,
Receding and speeding,
And shocking and I'ocking,
And darting and parting.
And threading and spreading.
And whizzing and hissing, •
And dripping and skipping.
And hitting and splitting.
And shining and twining,
And rattling and battling,
And shaking and quaking.
And pouring and roaring,
And waving ancf raving.
And tossing and crossing.
And flowing and going.
And running and stunning,
And foaming and roaming.
And dinning and si-inning.
And dropping and hopping,
And working and jerking.
And guggling and struggling.
And iieaving and cleaving.
And moaning and groaning;
And glittering and frittering.
And gathering and feathering.
And whitening and brightening.
And (piivering and shivering.
Ami hurrying and skurrying.
And thundermgand floundering;
Dividing and gliding and sliding.
And falling and brawling and
sprawling.
b'2-2
sour HEY.
And driving and riving and striv-
ing,
xind sprinkling and twinlcling and
wrinkling,
And sounding and bounding and
rounding,
And bubbling and troubling and
doubling.
And grumbling and rumbling and
tumbling.
And clattering and battering and
shattering;
Retreating and beating and meeting
and sheeting.
Delaying and straying and playing
and spraying,
Advancing and prancing and glancing
and dancing,
Recoiling, turmoiling and toiling and
boiling,
And gleaming and streaming and
steaming and beaming.
And rushing and Hushing and brush-
ing and gushing.
And flapping and rapping and clap-
ping, and slapping.
And curling and whirling and purl-
ing and twirling.
Ami thumping antl plumping and
bumping and jumping.
And dashing and flashing and splash-
ing and aiashing;
And so never ending, but always de-
scending.
Sounds and motions forever and ev^er
are blending
All rtt once, and all o'er, with a
mighty uproar, —
And this way, the water conies down
at Lodore.
THE EUn-TIDE.
Slowly thy flowing tide
Came in, old Avon ! scarcely did
mine eyes.
As watchfully 1 roamed thy green-
wood side,
Behold the gentle rise.
With many a stroke and strong.
The laboring boatmen upward plied
their oars,
And yet the eye beheld them labor-
ing long
Between thy winding shores.
Now down thine ebbing tide
The unlabored boat falls i-apidly
along,
The solitary helmsman sits to guide.
And sings an idle song.
Now o"er the rocks, that lay
So silent late, the shallow current
roars ;
Fast flow tliy waters on their sea-
ward way
Through wider-spreading shores.
>\_von ! I gaze and know !
The wisdom emblemed in thy vary-
ing way,
It speaks of human joys that rise so
slow.
So rapidly decay.
Kingdoms that long have stood,
And slow to strength and power at-
tained at last.
Thus from the smnmit of high for-
tune's flood
Ebb to their ruin fast.
So tardily appears
The course of time to manhood's en-
vied stage,
Alas! how hurryingly the ebl)i!ig
years
'I'hen hasten to old age !
TO THE FIRE.
My friendly fire, thou blazest clear
and bright.
Nor smoke nor ashes soil thy grate-
ful flame;
Thy temperate splendor cheers the
gloom of night.
Thy geiual heat enlivens the
chilled frame.
I lov0 to muse me o'er the evening
hearth,
I love to pause in meditation's
sway;
And whilst each object gives reflec-
tion birth,
Mark thy brisk rise, and see thy
slow decay ;
And I would wish, like thee, to shine
serene.
Like thee, within mine influence,
all to cheer;
Anil wish at last in life's declining
scene,
As I had beamed as bright, to fade
as clear:
So might my children ponder o'er my
shrine.
And o'er my ashes muse, as I will
muse o'er thine.
Robert Southwell.
CONTENT AND RICH.
My conscience is my crown ;
Contented thoughts, my rest ;
My heart is happy in itself.
My bliss is in my breast.
Enough I reckon wealth ;
That mean, the surest lot.
That lies too high for base contempt,
Too low for envy's shot.
My wishes are but few ;
All easy to fulfil:
I make the limits of my power
The bounds unto my will.
I fear no care for gold,
' Well-doing is my wealth ;
My mind to me an empire is.
While grace affordeth health.
I clip high-climbing thoughts.
The wings of swelling pride;
Their fall is worst that from the height
Of greatest honor slide.
Since sails of largest size
The storm doth soonest tear,
I bear so low and small a sail
As f reeth me from fear.
I wrestle not witli rage
While fury's flame doth burn;
It is in vain to stop the stream
lentil the tide doth turn.
Tjut when the flame is out.
And ebbing wrath doth end,
I turn a late enraged foe
Into a quiet friend.
And, taught with often proof,
A tempered calm I And
To be most solace to itself.
Best cure for angry mind.
Spare diet is my fare.
My clothes more ht than flue;
I know I feed and clothe a foe.
That pampered would repine.
I envy not their hap
Whom favor doth advance;
I take no pleasure in their pain
That have less happy chance.
To rise by others' fall
I deem a losing gain ;
All states with others' ruin built
To ruin run amain.
Xo change of Fortune's calm
Can cast my comforts down :
When Fortune smiles, 1 smile to think
How quickly she will frown.
And when, in froward mood,
She proved an angry foe,
Small gain, I found, to let her come —
Less loss to let her go.
524
SPENCER— SPENSER.
Robert William Spencer.
THE SPEED OF HAPPY HO UPS.
Too late I stayed— forgive the crime-
Unheeded flew the hours :
How noiseless falls the foot of Time
That only treads on flowers I
And who, with clear account, remarks
The ebbings of his glass,
When all its sands are diamond
sparks,
That dazzle as they pass ?
Ah ! who to sober measurement
Time's happy swiftness brings,
When birds of paradise have lent
Their ijlumage to his wings ?
Edmund Spenser.
\_From The Epi halamium.]
THE BUIDE BEAUTIFUL, BODY
AND SOUL.
Now is my love all ready forth to
come :
Let all the virgins therefore well
await ;
And ye, fresh boys, that tend upon
her groom.
Prepare yourselves, for he is coming
straight.
Set all your things in seemly good
array.
Fit for so joyful day :
The joyfuU'st day that ever sun did
see.
Fair sun! show forth thy favorable
ray,
And let thy lifef ul heat not fervent be,
For fear of burning her sunshiny face.
Her beauty to disgrace.
O fairest Phrebus ! father of the Muse !
If ever I did honor thee aright,
Or sing the thing that might thy
mind delight.
Do not thy servant's simple boon
refuse.
But let this day, let this one day be
mine;
Let all the rest be thine.
Then I thy sovereign praises loud will
sing.
That all the woods shall answer, and
their echo ring.
Lo! where she comes along with
portly pace.
Like Phcebe, from her chamber of
the east.
Arising forth to run her mighty race.
Clad all in white, that seems a virgin
best.
So well it her beseems, that ye would
ween
Some angel she had been.
Her long loose yellow locks; like
golden wire
Sprinkled \\\t\\ pearl, and pearling
tlowers atween,
Do like a golden mantle her attire;
And being crowned with a garland
green.
Seem like some maiden queen.
Her modest eyes, abashed to behold
So many gazers as on her do stare.
Upon the lowly ground affixed are;
Ne dare lift up her countenance too
bold,
But blush to hear her praises sung so
loud.
So far from being proud.
Nathless do ye still loud her praises
sing.
That all the woods may answer, and
your echo ring.
Tell me, ye merchants' daughters, did
ye see
So fair a creature in your town be-
fore '?
SPENSEB.
525
So sweet, so lovely, and so mild as
she,
Adorned with beauty's grace and
virtue's store;
Her goodly eyes like sapphires shin-
ing bright,
Her forehead ivory white.
Her clieeks like apples which the sun
hatli ruddied.
Her lips lilce cherries charming men
to bile.
Her breast like to a bowl of cream
uncrudded.
Why stand ye still, ye virgins in
amaze,
Upon her so to gaze,
Whiles ye forget yom* former lay to
sing
To which the woods did answer, and
your echo ring !
But if ye saw that which no eyes can
see.
The inward beauty of her lively
sprite.
Garnished with heaven by gifts of
high degree.
Much more then would ye wonder at
that sight.
And stand astonished like to those
which read
Medusa's mazeful head.
There dwells sweet Love, and con-
stant Chastity,
Unspotted Faith, and comely Wom-
anhood,
Regard of Honor, and mild Modesty;
There Virtue reigns as queen in royal
tlirone.
And giveth laws alone.
The which the base affections do obey,
And yield their services unto her
will:
Ne thought of things uncomely ever
may
Thereto approach to tempt her mind
to ill.
Had ye once seen these her celestial
treasures.
And unrevealed pleasures.
Then would ye wonder and her i^raises
sing.
That all the woods would answer, and
your echo ring.
[From The Faerie Queene.'\
THE CAPTIVE SOUL.
What war so cruel, or what siege so
sore.
As that which strong affections do
apply
Against the fort of Reason evermore.
To bring the soul into captivity '>
Their force is fiercer through infir-
mity
Of the frail flesh, relenting to their
rage ;
And exercise most bitter tyranny
Upon the parts brought into their
bondage ;
No wretchedness is like to sinful vil-
lainage.
[From The Faerie Queene.]
A VARICE.
And greedy Avarice by him did ride.
Upon a camel laden all with gold ;
Two iron coffers hung on either side.
With precious metal full as they
might hold ;
And in his lap a heap of coin he told :
For of his wicked pelf his God he
made,
And vmto hell himself foi' money sold ;
Accursed usury was all his trade;
And right and wrong alike in equal
balance weighed.
His life was nigh unto death's door
yplaced.
And threadbare coat and cobbled
shoes he ware ;
Ne scarce good morsel all his life did
taste ;
But both from back and belly still
did spare.
To fdl his bags, and riches to com-
pare ;
Yet child nor kinsman living had he
none
To leave them to; but thorovigh daily
care
To get, and nightly fear to lose, his
own.
He led a wretched life unto himself
imknown.
526
.SFL-A^SEIi
Most wretched wight, whom nothing
might suffice,
AVhose greedy lust did iaeli. in- great-
est store,
Whose need liad end, but no end
covetize,
Whose weallli was want, whose
plenty made him poor,
Who had enough, yet wished ever-
more;
A vile disease; and eke in foot and
hand
A grievous gout tormented him full
sore.
That well lie could not touch, nor go,
nor stand.
Such one was Avarice, the fourth of
this fair band.
[Ffoiii Tlic Faerie Queene.]
UXA AND THE LION.
Nought is thereunder heaven's wide
hollowness
That moves more dear compassion
of mind
Than beauty brought t' uuMorthy
wretchedness
Through envy's snares, or fortune's
freaks inikind.
I, whether lately through her bright-
ness blind.
Or through allegiance and fast fealty.
Which I do owe unto all Avoman-
kind.
Feel my heart pierced with so great
agony.
When such I see, that all for pity I
could die.
And now it is impassioned so deep.
For fairest Una's sake, of whom 1
sing.
That my frail eyes these lines Avith
tears do steep.
To think how she through guileful
handling,
Though true as touch, though daugh-
ter of a king.
Though fair as ever living wight was
fair,
Though noi' in word nor deed ill-
meriting,
Is from her knight divorced in de-
spair.
And her due loves derived to that
vile witch's share.
Yet, she most faithful lady all this
Avhile,
Forsaken, woful, solitary maid.
Far from all people's preace, as in
exile,
In wilderness and wasteful deserts
strayed.
To seek her knight; who, subtily
betrayed
Through that late vision, which th"
Enchanter wrought.
Had her abandoned. She of nought
afraid,
Through woods and wasteness wide
him daily sought;
Yet wished tidings none of him unto
her brought.
One day, nigh weary of the irksome
way.
From her uidiasty beast she did
aliglit.
And on the grass her dainty limbs
did lay
In secret shadow, far from all men's
sight:
From her fair head her fillet she
nndight.
And laid her stole aside. Her an-
gel's face.
As the great eye of heaven, shined
bright.
And made a sunshine in the shady
place ;
Dill never mortal eye behold such
heavenly grace.
It fortimed, out of the thickest wood
A ramping lion rushed suddenly,
Hunting full greedy after salvage
blood ;
Soon as the royal virgin he did spy.
With gaping mouth at her ran greed-
To have at once devoured her tender
corse :
UNA AND THE LION.
Page 524.
SF£!NSER.
527
But to the prey whenas he drew
more nigh,
His bloody rage assuaged with re-
morse,
And, witli the sight amazed, forgot
his furious force.
Instead tliereof lie kissed her weary
feet,
And licked her lily hands with fawn-
ing tongue.
As he her wronged innocence did
weet.
Oh, how can beauty master the most
strong,
And simple truth subdue avenging
wrong!
Whose yielded pride and proud sub-
mission,
►Still di-eading death, when she had
marked long.
Her heart 'gan melt in great compas-
sion.
And drizzling tears did shed for pure
affection.
[From The Faerie Qtieene.]
A HOSPITAL.
Eftsoones unto an holy hospital.
That was foreby the way, she did
him bring;
In which seven Bead-men, that had
vowed all
Their life to service of high heaven's
king.
Did spend their days in doing godly
things:
Their gates to all were open ever-
more,
That by the weary way A\ere travel-
ling;
And one sat waiting ever them be-
fore.
To call in comers by, that needy were
and poor.
The first of them, that eldest was and
best.
Of all I lie house had charge and gov-
ernment,
As guardian and steward of the
rest :
His office was to give entertainment
And lodging unto all that came and
went ;
Not unto such as could him feast
again.
And double quite for that he on them
spent ;
But such, as want of harbor did con-
strain :
Those for God's sake his duty was to
entertain.
The second was as almoner of the
place :
His office was the hungry for to
feed.
And thirsty give to drink ; a work of
grace ;
He feared not once himself to be in
need,
Ne cared to hoard for those whom
he did breed :
The grace of God he laid up still in
store.
Which as a stock he left unto his
seed ;
He had enough; what need him care
for more ?
And had he less, yet some he would
give to the poor.
The third had of their wardrobe
custody.
In Mhicli were not rich tires, nor
garments gay.
The plumes of pride and wings of
vanity.
But clothes meet to keep keen cold
away,
And naked nature seemly to ari-ay ;
With which bare wretched wights lie
daily clad.
The images of God in earthly clay ;
And if that no spare clothes to give
he had.
His own coat he would cut, and it
distribute glad.
The fourth appointed by his office
was
Poor prisoners to relieve with gra-
cious aid,
528
SPENSER.
■r^'
And captives to redeem with price of
brass
From Turks and Saracens, whicli
tliem liad stayed ;
And tliougli they faulty were, yet
well he weighed,
That God to us forgiveth every hour
Much more than that, why they in
bands were laid;
And he, that harrowed hell with
heavy store,
The faulty souls from thence brought
to his heavenly bower.
The fifth had charge sick persons to
attend.
And comfort those in point of death
which lay;
For them most needeth comfort in
the end,
When sin, and hell, and death, do
most dismay
The feeble soul departing hence
away.
All is but lost, that living we bestow.
If not well ended at our dying day.
O man, have mind of that last bitter
throe ;
For as the tree does fall, so lies it
ever low.
[From The Faerie Queene.]
VICTOR r FROM GOD.
What man is he that boasts of fleshly
might
And vain assurance of mortality?
Which, all so soon as it doth come to
fight
Against spiritual foes, yields by and
by,
Or from the field most cowardly doth
fiy;
Ne let the man ascribe it to his skill,
That thorough grace hath gained vic-
tory.
If any strength we have, it is to ill;
But all the good is God's, both power
and eke will.
[From The Faerie Queene.]
AXGELIC CARE.
And is there care in heaven ? and is
there love
In heavenly spirits to these crea-
tures base.
That may compassion of their evils
move ?
There is : — else much more wretch-
ed were the case
Of men than beasts. But oh ! th' ex-
ceeding grace
Of Highest God that loves his crea-
tures so,
xind all his works with mercy doth
embrace.
That blessed angels he sends to and
fro.
To serve to wicked man, to serve his
wicked foe!
How oft do they their silver bowers
leave
To come to succor us that succor
want !
How oft do they with golden pin-
ions cleave
The flitting skies, like flying pur-
suivant, [tant!
Against foul fiends to aid us mili-
Tliey for us fight, they watch and
duly ward.
And their bright squadrons round
about us plant ;
And all for love and nothing for
re^ai-d ;
Oh, why should Heavenly God to men
have such regard ! «
SPOFFORD.
529
Harriet Prescott Spofford.
HEREAFTER.
Love, when all these years are silent, vanished quite and laid to rest,
When you and I are sleeping, folded breathless breast to breast.
When no morrow is before us, and the long grass tosses o'er us.
And our grave remains forgotten, or by alien footsteps pressed, —
Still that love of ours will linger, that great love enrich the earth.
Sunshine in the heavenly azure, breezes blowing joyous mirth;
Fragrance fanning off from flowers, melody of summer showers.
Sparkle of the spicy wood-fires roimd the happy autumn liearth.
That's our love. But you and I, dear, — shall we linger with it yet,
Mingled in one dewdrop, tangled in one siuibeam's golden net, —
On the violet's purple bosom, I the sheen but you the blossom,
Stream on sunset winds, and be the haze with which some hill is wet ?
Oh, beloved, — if ascending, — when we have endowed the world
With the best bloom of oiu- being, whither will our way be whirled ;
Through what vast and starry spaces, toward what awful holy places,
With a white light on our faces, spirit over spirit furled?
Only this our yearning answers, — whereso'er that way defile.
Not a film shall pai't us through the aeons of that mighty while,
In the fair eternal weather, even as phantoms still together,
Floating, floating, one forever, in the light of God's great smile!
THE NUN AND HARP.
What memory fired her pallid face,
"Wliat passion stirred her blood.
What tide of sorrow and desire
Poured its forgotten flood
Upon a heart that ceased to beat,
Long since, with thought that life
was sweet
When nights were rich with vernal
dus^k.
And the rose burst its bud ?
Had not the western glory then
Stolen through the latticed room,
Her funeral raiment would have shed
A more heart-breaking gloom ;
Had not a dimpled convent-maid
Hung in the doorway, half afraid.
And left the nielanclioly i)lace
Bright with her blush and bloom!
Beside the gilded harp she stood.
And through the singing strings
Wound those wan hands of folded
prayer
In murnuu'ous preludings.
Then, like a voice, the harp rang
high
Its melody, as climb the sky.
Melting against the melting blue,
Some bird's vibrating wings.
Ah, why, of all the songs that grow
Forever tenderer.
Chose she that passionate refrain
Where lovers 'mid the stir
Of wassailers that round them i)ass
Hide their sweet secret ? Now,
alas.
In her nim's habit, coifed and veiled.
What meant that song to her !
530
SPOFFORD.
Slowly the western ray forsook
The statue in its shrine;
A sense of tears thrilled all the air
Along the purpling line.
Earth seemed a place of graves that
rang
To hollow footsteps, while she sang,
" Drink to nie only with thine eyes.
And I will pledge Avith mine! "
OUR NEIGHBOR*
Old neighbor, for how many a year
The same horizon, stretching here.
Has held us in its happy bound
From Iiivermouth to Ipswich Sound !
How many a wave-washed day we've
seen
Above that low horizon lean.
And marked within the Merrimack
The self-same sunset reddening back.
Or in the Powow's shining stream.
That silent river of a dream !
Where Craneneck o'er the woody
gloom
Lifts her steep inile of apple-bloom :
AVhere Salisbury Sands, in yellow
length
With the great breaker measures
strength ;
Where Artichoke in shadow slides,
The lily on her painted tides —
There's naught in the enchanted view
That does not seem a part of you ;
Your legends hang on every hill,
Your songs have made it dearer still.
Yours is the river-road; and yours
Are all the mighty meadow floors
Where the loiig Hampton levels lie
Alone between the sea and sky.
Fresher in Follymill shall blow
The Mayflowers, that you loved them
so;
Prouder Deer Island's ancient pines
Toss to their measure in your lines ;
And purpler gleam old Appledore,
Because youff oot has trod her shore.
Still shall the great Cape wade to
meet
The storms that fawn about her feet,
The summer evening linger late
In many-rivered Stackyard Gate,
When we, when all your people here,
Have fled. But like the atmosphere,
You still the region shall surromid,
The spirit of the sacred ground.
Though you have risen, as mounts
the star,
Into horizons vaster far!
PALMISTRY.
A IJTTLE hand, a fair soft hand
Dimpled and sweet to kiss :
No sculptor ever carved from stone
A lovelier hand than this.
A hand as idle and as white
As lilies on their stems ;
Dazzling with rosy finger-tips,
Dazzling with crusted gems.
Another hand, — a tired old hand.
Written with many lines ;
A faithful, weary hand, whereon
The pearl of great price shines!
For folded, as the winged fly
Sleeps in the chrysalis.
Within this little palm I see
That lovelier hand tban this !
* J. G. Whittier.
FANTASIA.
We're all alone, we're all alone!
The moon and stars are dead and
gone :
The night's at deep, the wind asleep.
And thou and I are all alone !
What care have we though life there
be?
Tumult and life are not for me!
Silence and sleep about us creep;
Timiult and life are not for thee!
How late it is since such as this
Had topped the height of breathing
bliss!
And now we keep an iron sleep, —
In that grave thou, and I in this !
A FOUH-0' CLOCK.
Ah, happy day, refuse to go !
Hang in the heavens forever so!
Forever in mid-afternoon.
All, liappy day of hap])y June!
Pour out tliy sunshine on the hill,
The piny wood with perfume fill,
And breathe across the singing sea
Land-scented breezes, that shall be
Sweet as the gardens that they pass.
Where children tumble in the grass !
Ah, hajjpy day, refuse to go !
Hang in the heavens forever so !
And long not for thy blushing rest
In the soft bosom of the west,
But bid gray evening get her back
With all tlie stars upon her track !
Forget the dark, forget the dew.
The mystery of the midnight blue.
And only spread thy wide warm
wings [flings!
While Summer her enchantment
Ah, happy day, refuse to go!
Hang in the heavens forever so !
Forever let thy tender mist
Lie lilie dissolving amethyst
Deep in tlie distant dales, and shed
Tliy mellow glory overhead !
Yet wilt thou wander, — call the
thrush,
And have the Avilds and waters hush
To hear his passion-broken tune.
Ah, happy day of happy June!
A SAOIFDROP.
Only a tender little thing.
So velvet soft and white it is;
But March himself is not so strong,
With all the great gales that are his.
In vain his whistling storms lie calls,
In vain the cohorts of his power
Bide down the sky on mighty
blasts —
He cannot crush the little flower.
Its white spear parts the sod, the
snows
Than that white spear less snowy
are.
The rains roll off its crest like spray,
It lifts again its spotless star.
Blow, blow, dark March! To meet
you here,
Thrust upward from the central
gloom.
The stellar force of the old earth
Pulses to life in this slight bloom.
MY OWK SOXG.
Oh, glad am I that I was born !
For who is sad when flaming morn
Bursts forth, or when the mighty
night
Carries the soul from height
height !
to
To me, as to the child that sings.
The bird that claps his rain-washed
Avings, I flower.
The breeze that curls the sun-tipped
Comes some new joy with each new
hour.
•Joy in the beauty of the earth,
Joy in the fire upon tlie hearth,
Joy in that iDoteucy of love
In which I live and breathe and move !
Joy even in the shapeless thought
That, some day, when all tasks are
wrought,
I shall explore that vasty deep
Beyond the frozen gates of sleep.
For joy a'ttunes all beating things,
With me each rhythmic atom sings.
From glow till gloom, from mirk till
morn ;
Oh, glad am I that I was born !
MEASURE FOR MEASURE.
What love do I bring you? The
earth.
Full of love, were far lighter;
The great hollow sky. full of love,
Something slighter.
Earth full and heaven full were less
Than the full measure given ;
Nay, say a heart full, — the heart
Holds earth and heaven !
532
SPRAGUE.
Charles Sprague.
ODE ON ART.
When, from the sacred garden driven,
Man fled before his Maker's wrath,
An angel left her place in heaven.
And crossed the wanderer's snnless
path,
' Twas Ai't ! sweet Art ! new radiance
broke
Where her light foot flew o'er the
ground.
And thus, with seraph voice she
spoke —
" The Curse a blessing shall be
found."
,She led him through the trackless
wild.
Where noontide svmbeam never
blazed ;
The thistle shrunk, the harvest
smiled ;
And Nature gladdened as she gazed.
Earth's thousand tribes of living
things,
At Art's command, to him are
given ;
The village grows, the city springs.
And point their spires of faith to
heaven.
He rends the oak — and bids it ride,
To guard the shores its beauty
graced ;
He sniites the rock — upheaved in
Ijride,
See towers of strength, and domes
of taste.
Earth's teeming caves their wealth
reveal.
Fire bears his banner on the wave.
He bids the mortal poison heal.
And leaps triumphant o'er the
grave.
He plucks the pearls that stud the
deep,
Admiring Beauty's lap to fill;
He breaks the stubborn marble's
sleep.
And mocks his own Creator's skill.
With thoughts that swell his glowing
soul.
He bids the ore illume the page,
And, proudly scorning Time's con-
trol.
Commerces with an unborn age.
In fields of air he Avrites his name.
And treads the chambers of the
sky;
He reads the stars, and grasps the
flame
That quivers round the Throne on
high.
In war renowned, in peace sublime.
He moves in greatness and in grace ;
His power, subduing space and time,
Links realm to realm and race to
race.
THE WINGED WORSHIPPEnS.
Gay, guiltless pair,
What seek ye from the fields of
heaven ?
Ye have no need of prayer,
Ye have no sins to be forgiven.
Why perch ye here.
Where mortals to their Maker bend '?
Can your pure spirits fear
The God ye never could offend '?
Ye never knew
The crimes for which we come to
weep.
Penance is not for you.
Blessed wanderers of the upper deep.
To you, 'tis given
To wake sweet Nature's untaught
lays;
Beneath the arch of heaven
To chirp away a life of praise.
Then spread each wing,
Far, far above, o'er lakes and lands.
And join the choirs that sing
In yon blue dome not reared with
hands.
S PRAGUE.
53^
Or, if ye stay,
To note the consecrated hour.
Teach nie the airy way.
And let me try your envied power.
Ahove the crowd,
On upward wings could I but fly,
I'd bathe in yon bright cloud,
And seek the stars that gem the sky.
'Twere Heaven indeed
Through fields of trackless light to
soar.
On Nature's charms to feed,
And Nature's own great God adore.
THE FAMILY MEETING.
We are all here !
Father, mother,
Sister, brother.
All who hold each other dear.
Each chair is filled — we're all at
home ;
To-night let no cold stranger come;
It is not often thus around
Our old familiar hearth we're found.
Bless, then, the meeting and the spot ;
For once be every care forgot ;
Let gentle Peace assert her power,
And kind Affection rule the hour;
We're all — all here.
We're not all here!
Some are away — the dead ones dear,
Who thronged with us this ancient
hearth,
And gave the hour to guiltless mirth.
Fate, with a stern, relentless hand.
Looked in and thinned our little band ;
Some like a night-flash passed away.
And some sank, lingering, day by day;
The quiet graveyard — some lie
there —
And cruel Ocean has his share —
AVe're not all here.
We are all here!
Even they — the dead — though dead,
so dear.
Fond Memory, to her duty true.
Brings back their faded forms to
How life-like, through the mist of
years,
Each well-remembered face appears !
We see them as in times long past;
From each to each kind looks are
cast;
We hear their Avords, their smiles be-
hold.
They're round us as they were of
old —
We are all here.
We are all here !
Father, mother,
Sister, brother,
You that I love with love so dear.
This may not long of us be said ;
Soon must we join the gathered dead ;
And by the hearth we now sit round
Some other circle will be found.
Oh, then, that wisdom may we know,
Which yields a life of peace below!
So, in the world to follow this,
May each repeat, in words of bliss,
We're all — all here !
TO MY CIGAR.
Yes, social friend, I love thee well,
In learned doctors' spite;
Thy clouds all other clouds dispel.
And lap me in delight.
By thee, they cry, with phizzes long,
My years are sooner passed ;
Well, take my answer, right or wrong.
They're sweeter while they last.
And oft, mild friend, to me thou art,
A monitor, though still;
Thou speak' st a lesson to my heart
Beyond the preacher's skill.
Thou'rt like the man of w^orth, who
gives
To goodness every day,
The odor of whose virtue lives
When he has passed away.
When, in the lonely evening hoiu",
Attended but by thee,
O'er history's varied page I pore,
Man's fate in thine I see.
534
SP HAGUE.
Oft as thy snowy column grows,
Then hreaks and fahs away,
I trace how mighty realms thus rose,
Thus tumbled to decay.
Awhile like thee the hero burns,
And smokes and fumes around.
And then, like thee, to ashes turns.
And mingles with the ground.
Life's but a leaf adroitly rolled.
And time's the wasting breath.
That late or early, we behold.
Gives all to dusty death.
From beggar's frieze to monarch's
robe,
One common doom is passed ;
Sweet Nature's works, the swelling
globe.
Must all burn out at last.
And what is he who smokes thee
now ? —
A little moving heap.
That soon like thee to fate must bow.
With thee in dust must sleep.
But though thy ashes downward go.
Thy essence rolls on high;
Thus, when my body must lie low.
My soul shall cleave the sky.
FROM THE -'ODE ON SHAKESPEARE:'
Who now shall grace the glow-
ing throne.
Where, all unrivalled, all alone.
Bold Shakespeare sat, and looked
creation through.
The minstrel monarch of the
worlds he drew?
That throne is cold — that lyre in
death unstrung
On M'hose prouil note delighted Won-
der hung.
Yet old Oblivion, as in wrath he
sweeps.
One spot shall spare — the grave where
Shakespeare sleeps.
Rulers and ruled in common gloom
may lie.
But Nature's laureate bards shall
never die.
Art's chiselled boast and Glory's tro-
phied shore
Must live in numbers, or can live no
more.
While sculptured Jove some nameless
waste may claim, [fame;
Still rolls the Olympic car in Pindar's
Troy's doubtful walls in ashes passed
away.
Yet frown on Greece in Homer's
deathless lay;
Rome, slowly sinking in her crum-
bling fanes.
Stands all immortal in her Maro's
strains ;
So, too, yon giant empress of the isles,
On whose broad sway the sun forever
smiles.
To Time's unsparing I'age one day
must bend,
And all her triumphs in her Shake-
speare end !
O thou ! to whose creative power
We dedicate the festal hour.
While Grace and Goodness round
the altar stand,
Learning's anointed train, and Beau-
ty's rose-lipped band —
Realms yet unborn, in accents now
unknown,
Thy song shall learn, and bless it for
their own. [roves.
Deep in the West as Independence
His banners planting round the land
he loves.
Where Nature sleeps in Eden's in-
fant grace,
In Time's full hour shall spring a
glorious race.
Thy name, thy verse, thy language,
shall they bear.
And deck for thee the vaulted temple
there.
Our Roman-hearted fathers broke
Thy parent empire's galling yoke ;
But thou, harmonious master of the
mind.
Around their sons a gentler chain
Shalt bind;
Once more in thee shall Albion's
sceptre wave.
And what her monarch lost, her
iuonarch-bard shall save.
STEDMAN.
535
Edmund Clarence Stedman.
THE TEST.
Seven women loved bim. When
the wrinkled pall
Enwrapt him from their unfulfilled
desire
(Death, pale, triumphant rival, con-
quering all,)
They came, for that last look, around
his pyre.
One strewed white roses, on Miiose
leaves were hung
Her tears, like dew; and in discreet
attire
Warbled her tuneful sorrow. Next
among
The group, a fair-haired virgin
moved serenely.
Whose saintly heart no vain repin-
ings wrung,
Keached the calm dust, and there,
composed and queenly.
Gazed, but the missal trembled in
her hand :
*' That's with the past," she said,
"nor may I meanly
Give way to tears!" and passed into
the land.
The third hung feebly on the por-
tals moaning,
With whitened lips, and feet that
stood in sand,
So weak they seemed, — and all her
passion owning.
The fourth, a ripe, luxurious
maiden, came,
Half for such homage to the dead
atoning
By smiles on one who fanned a later
flame
In her slight soul, her fickle steps
attended.
The fifth and sixth were sisters; at
the same
Wild moment both above the image
bended,
And with immortal hatred each on
each.
Glared, and therewith her exultation
blended.
To know the dead had 'scaped the
other's reach!
Meanwhile, through all the words
of anguish spoken,
One lowly form had given no sound
of speech,
Through all the signs of woe, no sign
nor token :
But when they came to bear him
to his rest.
They found her beauty paled, — her
heart was broken :
And in the Silent Land his shade
contest
That she, of all the seven, loved him
best.
LAURA, MY nAULING.
Laura, my darling, the roses have
bhished
At the kiss of the dew, and our
chamber is hushed ;
Our murmuring babe to your bosom
has clung.
And hears in his slumber the song
that you sung;
I watch you asleep with your amis
round him thrown,
Your links of dark tresses wound in
with his own,
And the wife is as dear as the gentle
young bride
Of the hour when you first, darling,
came to my side.
Laura, my darling, our sail down the
stream
Of Youth's summers and winters
has been like a dream;
536
STEDMAN.
Years have btit rounded your wom-
anly grace.
And added their spell to the light of
your face ;
Your soul is the same as though jiart
were not given
To the two, like yourself, sent to bless
me from heaven, —
Dear lives, springing forth from the
life of my life,
To make you more near, darling,
mother, and wife !
Laiu-a, my darling, there's hazel-eyed
Fred,
Asleep in his own tiny cot by the bed,
And little King Arthur, whose curls
have the art
Of winding their tendrils so close
round my heart;
Yet fairer tlian either, and dearer
than both.
Is the true one who gave me in girl-
hood her troth :
For we, when we mated for evil and
good, —
What were we, darling, btit babes in
the wood ?
Laura, my darling, the years which
have flown
Brought few of the prizes I pledged
to my own.
I said that no sorrow should roughen
her way.
Her life should be cloudless, a long
summer's day.
Shadow and stmshine, thistles and
flowers,
Which of the two, darling, most have
been ours ?
Yet to-night, by the smile on your
lips, I can see
You are dreaming of me, darling,
dreaming of me.
Laura, my darling, the stars that we
knew
In our youth, are still shining as ten-
der and true;
The midnight is sounding its slum-
berous bell.
And I come to the one who has loved
me so well,
Wake, darling, wake, for my vigil is
done :
What shall dissever our lives which
are one ?
Say, while the rose listens under her
breath,
'• Xaught until death, darling, naught
imtil death!"
THE UNDISCOVERED COUNTRY.
Could we but know
The laud that ends our dark, un-
certain travel.
Where lie those happier hills and
meadows low, —
Ah, if beyond the spirit's inmost
cavil.
Aught of that country could we
siu'ely know.
Who would not go ?
Might we but hear
The hovering angels' high imagined
chorus,
Or catch, betimes, with wakeful
eyes and clear.
One radiant vista of the realm before
us, —
With one rapt moment given to see
and hear.
Ah, who would fear?
Were we quite sure
To find the peerless friend who left
us lonely,
Or there, by some celestial stream
as pure.
To gaze in eyes that here were lovelit
only —
This weary mortal coil, were we
quite sure,
Who would endure '?
THE TRYST.
Sleeping, I dreamed that thou wast
mine,
In some ambrosial lover's shrine.
My lips against thy lips were pressed.
And all our passion was confessed ;
So near and dear my darling seemed,
I knew not that I only dreamed.
STEDMAN.
Waking this mid and moonlit night,
I clasp thee close by lover's right.
Thou fearest not my -warm embrace.
And yet, so like the dream thy face
And kisses. I but half i^artake
The joy, and know not if I wake.
TOO LATE.
Crouch no more by the ivied walls,
AVeep no longer over her grave.
Strew no flowers when evening falls ;
Idly you lost what angels gave !
.Sunbeams cover that silent mound
With a warmer hue than your roses
red;
To-morrow's rain will bedew the
ground
With aT purer stream than the tears
you shed.
But neither the sweets of the scat-
tered flowers,
Nor the morning sunlight's soft com-
mand,
Nor all the songs of the summer
showers,
Can charm her back from tliat dis-
tant land.
Tenderest vows are ever too late !
She, who has gone, can only know
The cruel sorrow that was her fate,
And the words that were a mortal
woe.
Earth to earth, and a vain despair;
For the gentle spirit has flown away.
And you can never her wrongs repair.
Till ye meet again at the Judgment
Day.
THE DOORSTEP.
The conference-meeting through at
last.
We boys around the vestry waited
To see the girls come tripping past
Like snow-birds willing to be
mated.
Not braver he that leaps the wall
By level musket-flashes litten.
Than I, who stepped before them all
Who longed to see me get the
mitten.
But no, she blushed and took my
arm !
We let the old folks have the high-
way.
And started toward the Maple Farm
Along a kind of lovers' by-way.
I can't remember what we said,
'Twas nothing worth a song or
story ;
Yet that rude path by which we sped
Seemed all transformed apd in a
glory.
The snow was crisp beneath our feet,
The moon was full, the fields were
gleaming :
By hood and tippet sheltered sweet,
Her face witli youth and health
were beaming.
The little hand outside her muff, —
O sculptor, if you could but mould
. it! —
So liglitly touched my iacket-cuff,
To" keep it warm I liad to hold it.
To have her with me there alone, —
'Twas love and fear and triumph
blended.
At last we reached the foot-worn
■ stone
Where thatdelicious journey ended.
The old folks, too, were almost home;
Her dimpled hand the latches fin-
gered.
We heard the voices nearer come.
Yet on the doorstep still we lin-
gered.
She shook her ringlets from her head.
And with a "Thank you, Ned,"
dissembled.
But yet I knew she imderstood
With what a daring wish I trem-
bled.
538
STEDMAN.
A cloud passed kindly overhead,
The moon was slyly peeping
through it,
Yet hid its face, as if it said,
"Come, now or never! do it! do
it!''
My lips till tlien had only known
The kiss of mother and of sister,
But somehow, full upon her own
Sweet, rosy, darling mouth, — I
kissed her!
Perhaps 'twas boyish love, yet still,
O listless Avoman, weary lover!
To feel once more that fresh, wild
thrill
I'd give — but who can live youth
over ?
THE DISCO VEUER.
I HAVE a little kinsman
Whose earthly summers are but
three,
And yet a voyager is he
Greater than Drake or Frobisher,
Than all their peers together !
He is a brave discoverer.
And, far beyond the tether
Of them who seek the frozen Pole,
Has sailed where the noiseless surges
roll.
Ay, he has travelled whither
A winged pilot steered his bark
Through the portals of the dark,
Past hoary Mimir's well and tree,
Across the unknown sea.
Suddenly, in his fair young hour.
Came one who bore a flower,
And laid it in his dimpled hand
With this command:
" Henceforth thou art a rover!
Thou must make a voyage far.
Sail beneath the evening star.
And a wondrous land discover."
— With his sweet smile innocent
Our little kinsman went.
Since that time no word
From the absent has been heard.
Who can tell
How he fares, or answer well
W^hat the little one has found
Since he left us, outward bound;
Would that he might return!
Then should we learn
From the pricking of his chart
How the skyey roadways jjart.
Hush! does not the baby this way
bring.
To lay beside this severed curl.
Some starry offering
Of chrysolite or pearl ?
Ah, no! not so!
We may follow on his track,
But he comes not back.
And yet I dare aver
He is a brave discoverer
Of climes his elders do not know,
He has more learning than appears
On the scroll of twice three thou-
sand years.
More tlian in the groves is taught,
Or from furthest Indies brought;
He knows, perchance, how spirits
fare, —
What shapes the angels wear,
AVliat is their guise and speech
In those lands beyond om* reach —
And his eyes behold
Things that shall never, never be to
mortal hearers told.
SEEKING THE MAYELOIVER.
The sweetest sound our whole year
round —
'Tis the first robin of the spring!
The song of the full orchard choir
Is not so fine a thing.
Glad sights are common: Nature
draws [year.
Her random pictures through the
But oft her music bids us long
Remember those most dear.
To me, when in the sudden spring
I hear the earliest robin's lay.
With the first trill there comes again
One picture of the May.
The veil is parted wide, and lo,
A moment, though jny eyelids
close,
S TED MAN.
539
Once more I see that wooded hill
Where the arbutus grows.
I see the village dryad kneel,
Trailing her slender fingers through
The knotted tendrils, as she lifts
Their pink, pale llowers to view.
Once more I dare to stoop beside
The dove-eyed beauty of my choice,
And long to touch her careless hair,
And think how dear her voice.
My eager, wandering hands assist
With fragrant blooms her lap to fill.
And half by chance they meet her
own.
Half by our young hearts' will.
Till, at the last, those blossoms won, —
Like her, so pure, so sweet, so
shy,—
Upon the gray and lichened rocks
Close at her feet I lie.
Fresh blows the breeze through hem-
lock-trees,
The fields are edged with green
below; [love
And naught but youth and hope and
We know or care to know !
Hark! from the moss-clung apple-
bough, [broke
Beyond the tumbled wall, there
That gurgling music of the May, —
'Twas the first robin spoke!
I heard it, ay, and heard it not, —
For little then my glad heart wist
What toil and time should come to
pass.
And what delight be missed ;
Nor thought thereafter, year by year.
Hearing that fresh yet olden song.
To yearn for luiretuming joys
That with its joy l)elong.
ALL IX A LIFETIME.
Tiiou Shalt have sun and shower
from heaven above,
Tliou shalt have flower and thorn
from earth below,
Thine shall be foe to hate and friend
to love,
Pleasures that others gain, the ills
they know, —
And all in a lifetime.
Hast thou a golden day. a starlit
night.
Mirth, and music, and love without
alloy ?
Leave no drop undrunken of thy
delight :
Sorrow and shadow follow on thy
joy.
'Tis all in a lifetime.
What if the battle end and thou hast
lost?
Others have lost the battles thou
hast Avon :
Haste thee, bind thy wounds, nor
count the cost;
Over the field will rise to-mor-
row's sun.
"Tis all in a lifetime.
Laugh at the braggart sneer, the
open scorn, —
'Ware of the secret stab, the slan-
derous lie :
For seventy years of turmoil tliou
wast born.
Bitter and sweet are thine till these
go by.
'Tis all in a lifetime.
Reckon thy voyage well, and spread
the sail, —
Wind and calm and current shall
wari^ thy way ;
Compass shall set thee false, and
chart shall fail ;
Ever the waves shall use thee for
their play.
'Tis all in a lifetime.
Thousands of years agone were
chance and change.
Thousands of ages hence the same
shall be;
Xaught of thy joy and grief is new or
strange :
Gather apace the good that falls
to thee !
'Tis all in a lifetime!
Richard Henry Stoddard.
THE FLIGHT OF YOUTH.
There are gains for all our losses,
There are balms for all our pain :
But when youth, the dream, departs,
It takes something from our hearts.
And it never comes again.
We are stronger, and are better.
Under manhood's sterner reign:
Still we feel that something sweet
Followed youth, with flying feet,
And will never come again.
Something beautiful is vanished,
And we sigh for it in vain:
We behold it everywhere,
On the earth, and in the air,
But it never comes again.
^.V OLD SONG REVERSED.
" There are gains for all our losses."
So I said when I was young.
If I sang that song again,
'Twould not be Avith that refrain.
Which but suits an idle tongue.
Youth has gone, and hope gone with
it.
Gone the strong desire for fame.
Laurels are not for the old.
Take them, lads. Give Senex gold.
What's an everlasting name ?
When my life was in its summer
One fair woman liked my looks:
Now that Time has driven his plough
In deep farrows on my brow,
I'm no more in her good books.
" There are gains for all our losses?"
Gi'ave beside the wintry sea.
Where my child is, and my heart.
For they would not live apart,
What has been your gain to me ?
No, the words I sang were idle,
And will ever so i-emain :
Death, and age, and vanished youth,
All declare this bitter truth,
" There's a loss for every gain!"
AT LAST.
When first the bride and bridegroom
wed.
They love their single selves the
best;
A sword is in the marriage-bed.
Their separate slumbers are not
rest ;
They quarrel, and make up again.
They give and suffer worlds of pain.
Both right and wrong.
They struggle long. [old,
Till some good day, when they are
Some dark day, when the bells are
tolled.
Death having taken their best of life,
They lose themselves, and find each
other; [wife,
They know that they are husband.
For, weeping, they are father,
mother !
THE TWO BRIDES.
I SAW two maids at the kirk.
And botli were fair and sweet:
One in her wedding-robe.
And one in her winding-sheet.
The choristers sang the hymn.
The sacred rites were read.
And one for life to life.
And one to death was wed.
They were borne to their bridal-beds,
In loveliness and bloom ;
One in a merry castle.
And one in a solemn tomb.
One on the morrow woke
In a workl of sin and pain ;
But the otlier was happier far,
And never awoke aerain.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN.
This man Avhose homely face you
look upon.
Was one of nature's masterful, great
men;
STODDARD.
Born with strong arms, that unf ought
battles won;
Direct of speech, and cunning witli
the pen.
Chosen for large designs, he had the
art
Of winning with his humor, and he
went
Straight to his mark, which was the
human heart ;
Wise, too, for what he could not
break he bent.
Upon his back a more than Atlas-
load,
The burden of the Commonwealth,
was laid;
He stooped, and rose up to it, though
the road
Shot suddenly downwards, not a
whit dismayed.
Hold, warriors, councillors, kings!
AH now give jilace
To this dear benefactor of the
race.
HOWAHE SONGS BEGOT AND BRED.
How are songs begot and bred ?
How do golden measures flow ?
From the heart, or from the head,
Happy poet, let me know.
Tell me first how folded flowers
Bud and bloom in vernal bowers ;
How the south wind shapes its tune.
The harper, he, of June.
None may answer, none may know,
Winds and flowers come and go,
And the selfsame ca)ions bind
Nature and the poet's mind.
RATTLE THE WINDO]V.
Rattle the window, winds.
Rain, drip on the panes;
There are tears and sighs in our
hearts and eyes.
And a weary weight on our brains.
The gray sea heaves and heaves,
On the dreary flats of sand;
And the blasted limb of the church-
yard yew,—
It shakes like a ghostly hand.
The dead are engulfed beneath it,
Sunk in the grassy waves :
But we have more dead in our hearts
to-day
Than earth in all her graves !
SONGS UNSUNG.
Let no poet, great or small.
Say tliat he will sing a song;
For song coraeth, if at all.
Not because we woo it long,
But because it suits its will.
Tired at last of being still.
Every song that has been sung
Was before it took a voice.
Waiting since the world was young
For the poet of its choice.
Oh, if any waiting be.
May they come to-day to me !
I am ready to repeat
Whatsoever they impart ;
Sorrows sent by them are sweet,
They know how to heal the heart :
Ay, and in the lightest strain
Something serious doth remain.
What are my white hairs, forsooth.
And the wrinkles on my brow ?
I have still the soul of youth,
Try me, merry Pluses, now.
I can still with numbers fleet
Fill the world with dancing feet.
No, I am no longer young.
Old am I this many a year;
But my songs will yet be sung.
Though I shall not live to hear.
O my son that is to be.
Sing my songs, and think of me!
WHEN THE DRUM OF SICKNESS
BEATS.
When the drum of sickness beats
The change o' the watch, and we
are old.
Farewell, youth, and all its sweets.
Fires gone out that leave us cold!
542
STODDARD.
Hairs are white that once were black,
Each of fate the message saith ;
And the bending of the back
Salutation is to death.
PAIN AND PLEASURE.
Pain and pleasure both decay,
Wealth and poverty depart;
Wisdom makes a longer stay.
Therefore, be thou wise, my heart.
Land remains not, nor do they
Who the lands to-day control.
Kings and princes pass away,
Therefore, be thou fixed, my soul.
If by hatred, love, or pride
Thou art shaken, thou art wrong;
Only one thing will abide.
Only goodness can be strong.
OUT OF THE DEEPS OF HEAVEN.
Out of the deeps of heaven
A bird has flown to my door,
As twice in the ripening summers
Its mates have flown before.
Why it has flown to my dwelling
Nor it nor I may know;
And only the silent angels
Can tell when it shall go.
That it will not straightway vanish.
But fold its wings with me.
And sing in the greenest branches
Till the axe is laid to the tree,
Is the prayer of my love and terror ;
For my soul is sore distrest.
Lest I wake some dreadful morning.
And find but its empty nest !
WE SAT BY THE CHEERLESS
FIRESIDE.
We sat by the cheerless fireside,
Mother, and you, and I ;
All thinking of oiu- darling,
And sad enough to die.
He lay in his little coffin.
In the room adjoining ours,
A Christmas wreath on his bosom,
His brow in a band of flowers.
" We bury the boy to-morrow,"
I said, or seemed to say ;
" Woidd I could keep it from coming
By lengthening out to-day!
"Why can't I sit by the fireside.
As I am sitting now.
And feel my gray hairs thinning.
And the wrinkles on my brow ?
" God keep him there in his coffin
Till the years have rolled away!
If he must be buiied to-morrow,
Oh, let me die to-dav!"
THE HEALTH.
You may drink to your leman in
gold.
In a great golden goblet of wine;
She's as ripe as the wine, and as bold
As the glare of the gold :
But this little lady of mine,
1 will not profane her in wine.
I go where the garden so still is,
(The moon raining through,)
To pluck the white bowls of
lilies.
And drink her in dew!
the
SILENT SONGS.
If I could ever sing the songs
Within me day and night.
The only fit accompaniment
Would be a lute of light.
A thousand dreamy melodies,
Begot with pleasant pain,
Like "incantations float around
The chambers of my brain.
But when I strive to utter one.
It mocks my feeble art.
And leaves me silent, with the thorns
Of music in my heart !
William Wetmore Story.
THE VIOLET.
O FAINT, delicious, spring-time vio-
let,
Thine odor, like a key,
Turns noiselessly in memory's wards
to let
A thought of sorrow free.
The breath of distant fields upon my
brow
Blows through that open door
The sound of wind-borne bells, more
sweet and low.
And sadder than of yore.
It comes afar, from that beloved
place.
And that beloveil hoiu".
When life hung ripening in love's
golden grace.
Like grapes above a bower.
A spring goes singing through its
reedy grass;
The lark sings o'er my head,
Drowned in the sky. — Oh, pass, ye
visions, pass
I wouUl that I were dead !
Why hast thou opened that forbidden
door
From which I ever flee ?
O vanished Joy ! O Love, that art no
more.
Let my vexed spirit be !
O violet ! thy odor through my brain
Hath searched, and stung to grief
This sunny day, as if a curse did
stain
Thv velvet leaf.
THE UKEXPRESSKD.
Strive not to say the whole! the
poet in his art,
Must intimate the Avhole, and say tlie
smallest part.
The young moon's silver arc, her per-
fect circle tells.
The limitless, within Art's bounded
outline dwells.
Of every noble work, the silent part
is best;
Of all expression, that which cannot
be expressed.
Each act contains the life, each work
of art, the world.
And all the planet-laws are in each
dewdrop pearled.
WETMOUE COTTAGE, N AH ANT.
The hours on the old piazza
That overhangs the sea.
With a tender and pensive music
At times steal over me ;
And again, o'er the balcony lean-
ing,
We list to the surf on the beach,
That fills with its solemn warning
The intervals of speech.
We three sit at night in the moon-
light.
As we sat in the summer gone,
And we talk of art and nature
And sing as we sit alone ;
We sing the old songs of Sorrento,
Where oranges hang o' er the sea.
And our hearts are tender with
dreaming
Of days that no more shall be.
How gaily the hours went with us
In those old days that are gone !
Ah ! would we Avere all together.
Where now I am standing alone.
Could life be again so perfect "?
Ah, never! these years so drain
The heart of its freshness of feel-
But I lont
vain.
though the longing be
544
8T0WE.
Harriet Beecher Stowe.
LIFE'S MYSTERY.
Life's mystery, — deep, restless as
the ocean, —
Hath surged and wailed for ages to
and tro;
Earth's generations watch its cease-
less motion
As in and out its hollow moanings
flow ;
.Shivering and yearning by that mi-
known sea,
Let my soul calm itself, O Christ, in
thee !
Life's sorrows, with inexorable pow-
er.
Sweep desolation o'er this mortal
plain;
And human loves and hopes fly as
the chaff
Borne by the whirlwind from the
ripened grain : —
Ah, when before that blast my hopes
all flee,
Let my soul calm itself, O Christ, in
thee!
Between the mysteries of death and
life
Thou standest, loving, guiding, —
not explaining;
We aslv, and thou art silent, — yet we
gaze.
And our charmed hearts forget
their drear complaining!
No crushing fate, — no stony destiny I
Thou Lamb that hast been slain, we
rest in thee!
The many waves of thought, the
miglity tides,
The ground-swell that rolls up from
other lands.
From far-off worlds, from dim eter-
nal shores
Whose echo dashes on life's wave-
worn strands, —
This vague, dark tumult of the inner
sea
Grows calm, grows bright, O, risen
Lord, in thee!
Thy pierced hand guides the myste-
rious wheels ;
Thy thorn-crowned brow now
wears the crown of power;
And when the dark enigma presseth
sore
Thy patient voice saith, "Watch
with me one hour ! ' '
As sinks the moaning river in the
sea
In silver peace, — so sinks my soul in
Thee!
THE OTHER WORLD.
It lies around us like a cloud. —
A world we do not see ;
Yet the sweet closing of an eye
May bring us there to be.
Its gentle breezes fan our cheek;
Amid our worldly cares
Its gentle voices whisper love,
And mingle with our prayers.
Sweet hearts around us throb and
beat,
Sweet helping hands are stirred,
And palpitates the veil between
With breathings almost heard.
The silence, — awful, sweet, and
calm.
They have no power to break ;
For mortal words are not for them
To utter or partake.
So thin, so soft, so sweet they glide.
So near to press they seem, —
They seem to lull us to our rest,
And melt into our dream.
And in the hush of rest they bring,
'Tis easy now to see
How lovely and how sweet a pass
The hour of death may be.
STREET.
545
To close the eye, and close the ear,
Wrapped in a trance of bliss.
And gently dream in loving arms.
To swoon to that, — from tliis.
Scarce knowing if we wake or sleep,
Scarce asking where we are,
To feel all evil sink away.
All sorrow and all care.
Sweet souls around us! watch us still,
Press nearer to our side,
Into our thoughts, into our prayers,
With gentle helpings glide.
Let death between us be as naught,
A dried and vanished stream ;
Your joy be the reality,
Our suffering life, the dream.
Alfred Billings Street.
[From Frontenac]
QUEBEC AT SUXIHSE.
The fresh May morning's earliest
light.
From ^A'here the richest hues were
blended.
Lit on Cape Diamond's towering
height
Whose spangled ciystals glittered
bright,
Thence to the castle roof descended.
And bathed in radiance pure and
deep [steep.
The spires and dwellings of the
Still downward crept the strengthen-
ing rays ;
The lofty crowded roofs below
And t'ataraqui caught the glow.
Till tiie whole scene was in a blaze.
The scattered bastions, — walls of
stone
With bristling lines of cannon
croMued,
Whose nuizzles o'er the landscape
frowned
Blackly through their embrasures
— shone.
Point Levi's woods sent many a
wreath
Of mist, as though hearths smoked
beneath.
Whilst heavy folds of vapor gray
Upon St. Charles, still brooding, lay;
The basin glowed in splendid dyes
Glassing the glories of the skies.
And chequered tints of light and
shade
The banks of Orleans' Isle displayed.
[From Frontcnac]
QUEBEC AT SUXSET.
'TwAS in June's bright and glowing
prime
The loveliest of the summer time.
The laurels were one splendid sheet
Of crowded blossom everywhere :
The locust's clustered pearl was
sweet, [air
And the tall whitewood made the
Delicious with the fragrance shed
From the gold flowers all o"er it
spread.
In the rich pomp of dying day
Quebec, the rock-throned monarch,
glowed.
Castle and spire and dwelling gray
Tlie batteries rude that niched their
■way
Along the cliff, beneath the play
Of the deep yellow light, were gay.
And the curved flood, below that lay,
In flashing glory flowed;
Beyond, the sweet and mellow smile
Beamed upon Orleans' lovely isle;
Until the downward view
Was closed by mountain-tops that,
reared
Against the burnished sky, ajipeared
In misty dreamy hue.
West of Quebec's embankments rose
The forests in their wild repose.
Between the trunks, the radiance
slim
Here came with slant and quiver-
ing blaze;
Whilst there, in leaf-wreatlied arbors
dim,
Was gathering gray the twiliglit's
haze.
Wliere cut tlie bouglis the back-
ground glow
That striped the west, a glittering
belt.
The leaves transparent seemed, as
though
In the rich radiance they would
melt.
Upon a narrow grassy glade,
Wliere thickets stood in grouping
shade,
The light streaked down in golden
mist,
Kindled the shrubs, the greensward
kissed.
Until the ciover-blossoms white
Flashed out lilie spangles large and
bright.
This green and sun-streaked glade
Mas rife
With sights and sounds of forest life.
A robin in a bush was singing,
A flicker rattled on a tree ;
In liquid life-like tones round ringing
A tlu-asher piped its melody ;
Crouching and leaping with pointed
ear
From tliicket to thicket a rabl^it
sped.
And on the short delicate grass a
deer
Lashing the insects from off him,
fetf.
[From Froiitenac]
THE CANADIAN SPUING.
'TwAS May! the spring with magic
bloom
Leaped up from wint<^}'s frozen
tomb.
Day lit the river's icy mail:
The bland warm rain at evening
sank;
I"e fragments dashed in midnight's
gale;
The moose at morn the rii)ples
drank.
The yacht, that stood with naked
mast
In the locked shallows motionless
AVhen sunset fell, went curtseying
past
As breathed the morning's liglit
caress.
The woodman, in the forest deep.
At sunrise heard witli gladdening
thrill,
Where yester-eve was gloomy sleep.
The brown rossignol's carol shrill;
Where yester-eve the snowbank
spread
The hemlock's twisted roots be-
tween.
He saw the coltsfoot's golden head
Rising from mosses plump and
green ;
Whilstall aromid were budding trees.
And mellow sweetness tilled the
breeze,
A few days passed along, and brought
More changes as by magic wrought.
AVith plumes were tipped thebeechen
sprays ;
The birch, long dangling tassels
showed ;
The oak still bare, but in a blaze
Of gorgeous red the maple glowed;
With clusters of the purest white
Cherry and shadbush charmed the
sight
Like spots of snow tlie boughs
among;
And showers of strawberi-y blossoms
made
Rich cai-pets in each field and glade
Wliere day its kindliest glances
flung.
And air, too, hailed spring's joyous
sway ;
The bluebird warbled clear and
sweet ;
Then came the wren with carols gay,
The customed roof and porcli to
greet ;
The mockbird showed its varied skill ;
At evening moaned tlie whippoor-
will.
Type of the spring fi-om winter's
gloom!
The butterfly new being found ;
Whilst round the pink may-apple's
bloom.
Gave myriad drinking bees their
sound.
Great fleeting clouds the pigeons
made ;
When near her brood the hunter
strayed
AVlth trailing limp the partridge
stirred ;
Whilst a quick, feathered spangle
shot
Rapid as thought from spot to sjiot
yiiowing the fairv humming-bird.
[From Frontenac]
CAYUGA LAKE.
SwKET sylvan lake! in jnemory's
gold
Is set the time, when first my eye
From thy green shore beheld thee
hold
Thy mirror to the sunset sky !
No ripple brushed its delicate air,
Rich silken tints alone were there;
The far opposing shore displayed,
Mingling its hues, a tender shade;
A sail scarce seeming to the sight
To move, spread there its pinion
white.
Like some pure spirit stealing on
Down from its realm, by beauty won.
Oh, who could view the scene nor
feel
Its gentle peace within him steal.
Nor in his inmost bosom bless
lis pure and radiant loveliness ?
]\Iy heart bent down its willing knee
Before the glorious Deity ;
Beauty led up my heart to llim.
Beauty, though cold, and poor, and
dim
Before His radiance, beauty still
Tliat made my bosom deeply thrill ;
To higher life my being wrought,
And purified my every thought,
('rept like soft music througli my
mind.
Each feeling of my soul refined.
And lifted me that lovely even
One precious moment up to heaven.
Then, contrast wild, I saw the cloud
The next day rear its sable crest.
And heard with awe the thunder
loud
Come crashing o'er thy blackening
breast.
Down swooped the eagle of the blast.
One mass of foam was tossing high.
Whilst the red lightnings, fierce and
fast.
Shot from the wild and scowling
sky,
And bvu'st in dark and mighty train
A tumbling cataract, tlie i-ain.
I saw within the driving mist
Dim writhing stooping shapes, —
the trees
That the last eve so softly kissed.
And birds so filled with melodies.
Still swept the wind with keener
shriek,
The tossing waters higher rolled,
Still fiercer flashed the lightning's
streak.
Still gloomier frowned the tempest's
iold.
Ah, such, ah, such is life, I sighed.
That lovely yester-eve and this !
Now it reflects the radiant pride
Of youth and hope and promised
bliss.
Earth's future track an Eden seems
Brighter than e'en our brightest
dreams.
Again, the tempest rushes o'er.
The sky's blue smile is seen no more,
The placid deep to foam is tossed.
All trace of beauty, peace, is lost.
Despair is hovering, dark and wild.
Ah! what can save earth's stricken
child •?
Sweet sylvan lake! beside thee now.
Villages point their spires to
heaven,
Hich meadows wave, broad grain-
fields bow.
The axe resounds, the plough is
driven :
Down verdant points come herds to
drink.
Flocks sti-ew, like spots of snow, thy
blink;
548
STREET.
The frequent farm-house meets the
sight,
Mid falHng harvests scythes are
bright.
The watch-dog's bark comes faint
from far,
Shakes on tlie ear tlie saw-mill's jar,
The steamer like a darting bird
Parts the rich emerald of thy wave,
And the gay song and laugh are
heard,
But all is o'er the Indian's grave.
Pause, white man! check thy onward
stride !
Cease o'er the flood thy prow to
guide !
Until is given one sigh sincere
For those who once were monarchs
here.
And prayer is made beseeching God
To spare us his avenging rod
For all the wrongs upon the head
Of the poor helpless savage shed ;
Who, strong when we were weak, did
not
Trample us down upon the spot,
But, weak when we were strong, was
cast
Like leaves upon the rushing blast.
Sweet sylvan lake ! one single gem
Is in thy liquid diadem.
No sister has this little isle
To give its beauty smile for smile;
With it to hear the blue-bird sing;
" W^ake, leaves, wake, flowers! here
comes the spring! "
With it to weave for sunmier's
tread
Mosses below and bowers o'erhead;
With it to flash to gorgeous skies
Tlie opal pomp of autumn skies;
And when stern winter's tempests
blow
To shrink beneath his robes of snow.
Sweet sylvan lake ! that isle of thine
Is like one hope through grief to
shine:
Is like one tie our life to cheer;
Is like one flower when all is sere;
One ray amidst the tempest's might;
One star amidst the gloom of night.
A FOREST WALK.
A LOVEi>Y sky, a cloudless sun,
A wind that breathes of leaves and
flowers.
O'er hill, through dale, my steps have
run
To the cool forest's shadowy
bowers ;
One of the paths all round that wind,
Traced by the browsing herds, I
choose.
And sights and sounds of humaii kind
In Nature's lone recesses lose:
The beech displays its marbled l*ark.
The spruce its green tent stretches
wide,
AVhile scowls the hemlock grim and
dark.
The maple's scalloped dome beside.
All weave on high a verdant roof
That keeps the very sun aloof.
Making a twilight soft and green*
Within the columned, vaulted scene.
Sweet forest-odors have their birth
From the clothed boughs and teem-
ing earth ;
Where pine-cones dropi^ed, leaves
piled and dead
Long tufts of grass, and stars of
fern,
With many a wild flower's fairy
inn,
A thick, elastic carpet spread :
Here, with its mossy pall, the trunk,
Resolving into soil, is sunk;
There, wrenched but lately from its
throne
By some fierce whirlwind circling
past.
Its huge roots massed with earth and
stone.
One of the woodland kings is cast.
Above, the forest-tips are bi-iglit
AVith the broad blaze of sunny light;
But now a fitful air-gust parts
The screening branches, and a glow
Of dazzling, startling radiance darts
Down tlie dark stems, and lireaks
below :
The mingled shadows off are rolled.
The sylvan floor is bathed in gold;
STREET.
549
Low sprouts and herbs, before un-
seen
Display their shades of brown and
green :
Tints brighten o'er the velvet moss,
Gleams twinkle on the laurel's gloss;
The robin, brooding in her nest.
Chirps as the quick ray strikes her
breast ;
And, as my shadow prints the ground,
I see the rabbit upward bound,
AVith pointed ears an instant look.
Then scamper to the darkest nook,
Where, with crouched limb and star-
ing eye.
He watches while I saunter by.
A narrow vista, carpeted
With rich green grass, invites my
tread :
Here showers the light in golden dots,
There drops the shade in ebon spots,
So blended that the very air
Seems net-work as I enter there.
The partridge, whose deep-rolling
dnun
Afar has sounded in my ear.
Ceasing his beatings as I come,
Whirs to the sheltering branches
near ;
The little milk-snake glides away.
The brindled marmot dives from day;
And now, between the boughs, a
space
Of the blue, laughing sky, I trace:
On each side shrinks tlie bowery
shade ;
Before me spreads an emerald glade;
The sunshine steeps its grass and
moss ;
That couch my footsteps as I cross;
IMerrily hums the tawny bee,
Tlie glitteiing humming-bird I see;
Floats tlie bright butterfly along,
The insect choir is loud in song;
A spot of light and life, it seems, —
A fairy haunt for Fancy's dreams.
Here stretched, the pleasant turf I
press
In luxury of idleness ;
Sun-streaks, and glancing wings, and
sky
Spotted with cloud-shapes charm my
eye :
While murmuring grass and waving
trees —
Their leaf-harps sounding to the
breeze —
And water-tones that tinkle near,
Blend their sweet music to my ear;
And by the changing shades alone,
The imssage of tlie hours is known.
THE BLUE-BIRD'S SOXG.
Hakk. that sweet carol! With de-
light
We leave the stifling room;
The little bluebird meets our sight, —
Spring, glorious spring, has come !
The south-wind's balm is in the
air, [where
The melting snow-wreaths every-
Are leaping off in showers;
And Nature, in her brightening looks,
Tells that her flowers, and leaves,
and brooks.
And birds, will soon be ours.
[From " The Xook in flu- Forest.''']
A PICTURE.
The branches arch and shape a pleas-
ant bower.
Breaking white cloud, blue sky, and
sunshine bright
Into pure ivory and sapphire spots.
And flecks of gold ; a soft, cool eme-
rald tint
Colors the air, as though the delicate
leaves
Emitted self-born light. What splen-
did walls.
And what a gorgeous roof, carved by
the hand
Of glorious Nature I Here the spruce
thrusts in
Its bristling plume, tipped with its
pale-green points ;
The hemlock shows its borders
freshly fringed;
The smoothly-scalloped beech-leaf
and the birch.
Cut into ragged edges, interlace:
While here and there, through clefts,
the laurel hangs
Its gorgeous chalices half-brimmed
with dew.
550
SUCKLING.
As though to hoard it for the haunt-
ing elves,
The moonlight calls to this, their
festal hall. [the earth
A thick, rich, grassy carpet clothes
Sprinkled with autumn leaves. The
fern displays
Its fluted wreath, beaded beneath
with drops
Of richest brown; the wild-rose
spreads its breast
Of delicate pink, and the o'erhanging
tir
lias dropped its dark, long cone.
Sir John Suckling.
CONSTANCY.
Out upon it ! I have loved
Three whole days together;
And am like to love thee more,
If it prove fair weather.
Time shall moult away his wings.
Ere he shall discover
In the whole wide world again.
Such a constant lover.
But the spite on"t is, no praise
Is due at all to me ;
Love with me had made no stays.
Except it had been she.
Had it any been but she
And that very face.
There had been at least, ere this,
A dozen in her place !
WHY SO PALE AND WAN. FOND
LOVE II'
Why so pale and wan, fond lover?
Prithee, why so pale ?
Will, when looking well can't move
her.
Looking ill prevail ?
Prithee, why so pale ?
Why so dull and nuite, young sinner?
Prithee, why so mute ?
Will, when speaking well can't win
her.
Saying nothing do't ?
Prithee, why so mute !
Quit, quit for shame, this will not
move.
This cannot take her;
If of herself she will not love,
Nothing can make her:
The devil take her.
/ PRITHEE SEND ME BACK MY
HEART.
I PRITHEE send me back my heart.
Since I can not have thine.
For if from yours you will not part.
Why then should'st thou have
mine ?
Yet now I think on't, let it lie.
To find it were in vain ;
For thou' St a thief in either eye
Would steal it back again.
Why should two hearts in one bi-east
lie.
And yet not lodge together ?
O love! where is t:hy sympathy,
If thus our breasts thou sever ?
But love is such a mystery,
I cannot find it out;
For when I think I'm best resolved,
I then am in most doubt.
Then farewell, care, and farewell,
woe,
I will no longer pine;
For I'll believe I have her heart
As nuich as she has mine.
SURREY.
551
Earl of Surrey (Henry Howard).
THE MEANS
ro ATTAIX HAPPY
LIFE.
Martial, the things that do attain
Tlie hapi:)y life, be these, I tind ;
The riches left, not got with jjain ;
The fruitfnl ground, the quiet
mind :
The equal friend, no grudge, no
strife;
No charge of rule, nor governance ;
Without disease, the healthful life;
The household of continuance :
The mean diet, no delicate fare;
True wisdom joined with simple-
ness;
The night discharged of all care.
Where Avine the wit may not op-
press :
The faithful wife, without debate;
Such sleeps as may beguile the
night.
Content thee with thine own estate;
Ne wish for death, ne fear his
misrht.
FROir "XO AGE IS COXTEyiV
I saw the little boy
In thought — how oft that he
Did wish of God to "scape the rod,
A tall yoiuig man to be :
The young man eke. that feels
His bones with pains opprest,
How he would be a rich old man,
To live and lie at rest.
The rich old man that sees
His end draw on so sore.
How he Avould be a boy again,
To live so nuich the more;
Whereat full oft I smiled.
To see how all these three,
From boy to man, from man to boy,
Would chop and change degree.
IN PPAISE OF HIS LADY-LOVE
COMPARED WITH ALL OTIIEIIS.
Give place, ye lovers, here before
That spent your boasts and brags
in vain;
My lady's beauty passeth more
The best of yours, I dare well
say'n.
Than doth the sun the candle
light.
Or brightest day the darkest night.
And thereto hath a troth as just
As had Tenelope the fair:
For what she saith ye may it trust,
As it l)y writing sealed were:
And virtues hath she many mo'
Than I with pen have" skill to
show.
I could rehearse, if that I would,
The whole effect of Nature's plaint,
When she had lost the perfit mould.
The like to whom she could not
paint :
With wringing hands, how she did
ci-y,
And what she said. I know it. I.
I know she SAvore with raging mind.
Her kingdom only set apart.
There was no loss by law of kind
That could have gone so near her
heart ;
And this was chiefly ail her pain:
■'yiie could not make the like
a lips that had whispered, the eyes that had lightened.
liOve was dead.
Or they loved their life through, and then went whither ?
And were one to the end — but what end who knows ?
Love deep as the sea, as a rose must wither.
As tlie rose-red sea-weed that mocks tlie rose.
Shall the dead take thotight for the dead to love them ?
What love was ever as deep as a a;rave ?
They are loveless now as the grass above them,
Or the wave.
All are at one now. roses and lovers,
Not known of the cliffs and the fields and the sea.
Not a breath of the time that has been hovers
In the air now soft with a summer to be.
Not a breath shall there sweeten the seasons hereafter
Of the flowers or the lovers that laugh now or weep.
When, as they that are free now of weeping and laughter,
We shall sleep.
Here death may deal not again forever;
Here change may come not till all change end.
From the graves they have made they shall rise up never,
Who have left naught living to ravage and rend.
Earth, stones, and thorns of the wild ground growing,
While the sun and the rain live, these shalTbe;
Till a last wind's breath upon all these blowing
Roll the sea ;
Till the slow sea rise and the sheer cliff crumble.
Till terrace and meadow the deep gulfs drink.
Till the strength of the waves of the'high tides humble
The fields that lessen, the rocks that shrink.
Here now in his triumph where all things falter.
Stretched out on the spoils that his own hand spread,
As a god self-slain on his own strange altar,
Death lies dead.
A MATCff.
If love were what the rose is,
And I were like the leaf,
Our lives would grow together
In sad or singing weather.
Blown fields or flowerful closes,
Green pleasure or gray grief :
If love were what the rose is.
And I were like the leaf.
If I were what the words are.
And love were like the tune.
With double sound and single
Delight our lips would mingle,
With kisses glad as birds are
That get sweet rain at noon;
If I were what the words are
And love were like the tune.
If you were life, my darling.
And I your love were death.
We'd shine and snow together
Ere March made sweet the weather
With daffodil and starling
And hours of fruitful lireath;
If you were life, my darling.
And 1 your love were death.
If you were thrall to sorrow,
And I were page to joy.
We'd play for lives and seasons.
With loving looks and treasons
And tears of night and morrow.
And laughs oi maid and boy;
If you were thrall to sorrow.
And I were page to joy.
556
SWINBURNE.
If you were April's lady,
And I were lord in ]May,
We'd throw with leaves tor hours.
And draw for days with flowers,
Till day like niu;lit were shady.
And night were hright like day;
If you were April's lady,
And I were lord in May.
If you were queen of pleasure,
And I were king of pain.
We'd hunt on the soldier's cheek
Washed off the stains of powder.
Beyond the darkening ocean biu'ned
The bloody sunset's embers,
While the Crimean valleys learned
How English love remembers.
And once again a fire of hell
Kained on the Russian quarters,
AVith scream of shot, and burst of
shell,
And bellowing of the mortars !
And Irish Nora's eyes are dim
For a singer, dundj and gory ;
And English Mary moiu'ns for him
AVho sang of " Airnie Lawrie."'
Sleep, soldiers! still in honored rest
Your truth and valor wearing:
The bravest are the tenderest, —
The loving are the daring.
TO A BAVARIAN GIRL.
Tuou, Bavaria's brown-eyed daugh-
ter.
Art a shape of joy.
Standing by the Isar's water
With thy brother-boy;
In thy dream, with idle fingers
Threading through his ctu'ls.
On thy cheek the sun's kiss lingers,
Rosiest of girls !
Woods of glossy oak are ringing
With the echoes bland.
While thy generous voice is singing
Songs of Fatherland, —
Songs, that by the Daiuibe's river
Sound on hills of vine.
And where waves in green light
quiver,
Down the rushing Rhine.
Life, with all its hues and changes,
To thy heart doth lie
Like those di'eamy Alpine ranges
In the southern sky;
Where in haze the clefts are hidden,
Which the foot should fear.
And the crags that fall luibidden
Startle not the ear.
Where the village maidens gather
At the fountain's brim.
Or in sunny harvest weather.
With the reapers trim ;
Where the autumn fires are burning
On the vintage-hills ;
Where the mossy wheels are turning
In the ancient mills ;
Where from ruined robber towers
Hangs the ivy's hair.
And the crimson foxbell floAvers
On the crumbling stair; —
Everywhere, without thy presence.
Would the sunshine fail.
Fairest of the maiden peasants I
Flower of Isar's vale.
Sir Henry Taylor.
[From Philip Van Artevelde.]
I TNKiXO JFa\ ore A TNESS.
He was a man of that unsleeping
spirit.
He seemed to live by miracle; his
food
Was glory, which was poison to his
nund
And peril to his body. He was one
Of many thousand such that die be-
times,
Whose story is a fragment, known
to few.
Then comes the man who has the
luck to live.
And he's a prodigy. Compute the
chances,
And deem there's ne'er a one in dan-
gerous times
Who wins the race of glory, but than
him
A thousand men more gloriously en-
dowed
Have fallen upon the course ; A thou-
sand others
Have had their fortunes foundered
by a chance,
Whilst "lighter barks pushed past
them ; to whom add
A smaller tally, of the singular few
Who, gifted with predominating pow-
ers,
Bear yet a temperate will and keep
the peace.
The world knows nothing of its great-
est men.
[From Philip Van Artevehle.]
THE MYSTERY OF LIFE.
This circulating princiiile of life
That vivifies the outside of the earth
And permeates the sea; that here
and there
Awakening up a particle of matter.
Informs it, organizes, gives it power
To gather and associate to itself.
Transmute, incorporate other, for a
term
Sustains the congruous fabric, and
then quits it ;
This vagrant principle so multiform,
Ebullient here and undetected there,
Is not unauthorized, nor increate.
Though indestructible. Life never
dies ;
Matter dies off it, and it lives else-
where,
Or elsehow circumstancetl and
shaped; it goes;
At every instant we may say 'tis gone,
But never it hath ceased ; the type is
changed.
Is ever in transition, for life's law
To its eternal essence doth prescribe
Eternal nmtability; and thus
To say I live — says, I partake of that
Which never dies. But how far I
may hold
An interest indivisible from life
Through change (and whether it be
mortal change.
Change of senescence, or of gradual
growth,
Or other whatsoever 'tis alike)
Is question not of argument, but fact.
In all men some such interest inheres ;
In most 'tis posthumous; the more
expand
Our thoughts and feelings past the
very present,
The more that interest overtakes of
change
And comprehends, till what it com-
prehends
Is comprehended in eternity.
And in no less a span.
Here we are
Engendered out of nothing cogniza-
ble.
If this be not a wonder, nothing is;
If this be Monderful, then all is so.
Asian's grosser attributes can generate
What is not, and has never been at all ;
What should forbid his fancy to
restore
A being passed away '? The wonder
lies
In the mind merely of the wondering
man.
Treading the steps of common life
with eyes
Of curious inquisition, some will stare
At each discovery of Nature's ways,
As it were new to find that God con-
trives.
[From Philip Van Artevelde.']
LOVE RELUCTANT TO ENDANGER
ITS OBJECT.
TiiF.nE is but one thing that still
harks me back.
To bring a cloud upon the summer
day
Of one so happy and so beautiful, —
It is a hard condition. For myself,
I know not that the circumstance of
life
In all its changes can so far afflict me
As makes anticipation much worth
while.
But she is younger, — of a sex beside
Whose spirits are to ours as flame to
fire.
More sudden, and more perishable
too;
So that the gust wherewith the one
is kindled
Extinguislies the other. O she is fair!
As fair as heaven to look upon ! as
fair
As ever vision of the Virgin blest
That weary pilgrim, resting by the
fount
Beneath the palm, and dreaming to
the tune
Of flowing waters, duped his soul
withal.
It was permitted in my pilgrimage
To rest beside the fomit beneath the
tree,
Beholding there no vision, but a maid
Whose form was light and graceful
as the palm.
Whose heart was pure and jocund as
the fount.
And spread a freshness and a ver-
dure round.
This was iiermitted in my pilgrimage.
And loath am I to take my staff again,
Say that I fall not in this enterprise ;
Yet must my life be full of hazardous
turns.
And they that house with me must
ever live
In imminent peril of some evil fate.
\_From Phiiij) Van Artevelde.]
NATURE'S NEED.
The human heart cannot sustain
Prolonged unalterable pain,
And not till reason cease to reign
Will nature want some moments brief
Of other moods to mix with grief;
Such and so hard to be destroyed
That vigor wliieh abhors a void.
And in the midst of all distress.
Such Nature's need for happiness!
And when she rallied thus, more
high
Her spirits ran, she knew not why.
Than was their wont, in times than
these
Less troubled, with a heart at ease.
So meet extremes: so joy's rebound
Is highest from the hollowest ground;
So vessels with the storm that strive
Pitch higher as they deeplier dive.
[From Philip Van Artevelde.]
WHEN JO YS ARE KEEXES T.
The sweets of converse and society
Are sweetest when they're snatched;
the often-comer.
The boon companion of a thousand
feasts.
Whose eye has grown familiar with
the fair.
Whose tutored tongue, by practice
perfect made,
Is tamely talkative, — he never knows
That truest, rarest light of social joy
Which gleams upon the man of many
cares.
[From Philip Van Artevelde.]
RELAXATION.
It was not meant
By him who on the back the biu'den
bound.
That cares, though public, critical,
and grave.
Should so encase us and encrust, as
shuts
The gate on what is beautiful below.
And clogs those entries of the soul of
man
Whicli lead the way to what he hath
of heaven.
JVHAT MAKES A HERO'
What makes a hero ? — not success,
not fame.
Inebriate merchants, and the loud
acclaim
Of glutted Avarice, — caps tossed
up in air.
Or pen of journalist with flourish
fair;
Bells pealed, stars, ribbons, and a
titular name —
These, though his rightful tribute,
he can spare ;
His rightful tribtite, not his end or
aim.
Or true reward ; for never yet did
these
i)i-J,
TAYLOR.
Refresh llie soul, or set the heart
at ease.
What makes a hero '.* — An heroic
mind,
Expressed in action, in endurance
proved. [right.
And if there be pre-eminence of
Derived through pain well suffered,
to the height
f)f rank heroic, 'tis to bear un-
moved.
Not toil, not risk, not rage of sea or
wind,
Not the brute fury of barbarians
blind.
But worse — ingratitude and poi-
sonous darts,
Launched by the country he had
served and loved:
This, with a free, unclouded spirit
pure,
This, in the strength of silence to
endure,
A dignity to noble deeds imparts
Beyond the gauds and trappings of
renown ;
This is the hero's complement and
crown ;
This missed, one struggle had been
wanting still, —
One glorious triumph of the heroic
will.
One self-approval in his heart of
hearts.
Jane Taylor.
THE SQCIRE\S PE]V.
A SLANTING ray of evening light
Shoots through the yellow pane;
It makes the faded crimson bright.
And gilds the fringe again;
The window's gothic framework falls
In oblique shadow on the walls.
And since those trappings first were
new.
How many a cloudless day.
To rob the velvet of its hue.
Has come and passed away ;
How many a setting sun bath made
That curious lattice-work of shade !
Crumbled beneath the hillock green
Tlie cunning; hand must be.
That carved this fretted door, I ween.
Acorn, a,nd Jienr-de-Us ;
And )iow the worm hath done her
part
In mimicking the chisel's art.
In days of yore (as now we call^
When the first Jaiiics was king.
The courtly knight from yonder hall
Hither his train did bring;
All seated round in order due,
AVith broidered suit and buckled shoe.
On damask cushions, set in fringe,
All reverently they knelt:
Prayer-books, witli brazen hasp and
hinge.
In ancient English spelt.
Each holding in a lily hand.
Responsive at the priest's counuand.
Now, streaming down the vaulted
aisle,
The sunbeam, long and lone.
Illumes the chai'acters awhile
Of their inscription-stone ;
And there, in marble hard and
cold.
The knight and all his train behold.
Outstretched together, are expressed
He and my lady fair;
With hands uplifted on the breast.
In attitude of prayer ;
Long-visaged, clad in armor, he, —
With ruffled ann and bodice, she.
Set forth in order ere they died.
The numerous offspring bend;
Devoutly kneelin2*side by side,
As though they did intend
For past omissions to atone.
By sayirig endless prayers in stone.
TENNYSON.
573
These mellow days are past and dim.
But generations new,
In regular descent from him,
Have filled the stately pew;
And in the same succession go,
To occupy the vault below.
And now, the polished, modern squire
And his gay train api)ear,
Who duly to the hall retire,
A season, every year, —
And fill the seats with belle and beau,
As 'twas so many years ago.
Perchance, all though tlessas they tread
The hollow soimding floor.
Of that dark house of kindred dead,
Which shall, as heretofore,
In turn, receive, to silent rest,
Another, and another guest, —
The feathered hearse and sable
train,
In all its wonted state.
Shall wind along the village lane.
And stand before the gate ;
Brought many a distant country
through.
To join the final rendezvous.
And when the race is swept away.
All to their dusty beds,
Still shall the mellow evening ray
Shine gayly o"er their heads:
While other faces, fresh and new.
Shall occupy the squire's pew.
Alfred Tennyson.
COUPLETS FROM ''LOCKSLEY HALL."
Love took up the glass of Time, and turned it in his glowing hands:
Every moment, lightly shaken, ran itself in golden sands.
Love took up the harp of Life, and smote on all the chords with might:
Smote the chord of Self, that, trembling, passed in music out of sight.
As the husband is, the wife is: thou art mated with a clown,
And the grossness of his nature will have weight to drag thee down.
He will hold thee, when his passion shall have spent its novel force,
Something better than his dog, a little dearer than his horse.
Comfort ? comfort scorned of devils ! this is truth the poet sings,
That a sorrow's crown of sorrow is remembering happier things.
Drug thy memories, lest thou learn it, lest thy heart be put to proof,
In the dead unhappy night, when the rain is on the roof.
Not in vain the distance beacons. Forward, forward let us range,
Let the great world spin forever dowTi the ringing grooves of change.
Thro' the shadow of the globe we sweep into the younger day:
Better fifty years of Europe than a cycle of Cathay.
574
TENNrSON.
[From In Memoriam.]
STUOXG SON OF GOD.
Strong Son of God, immortal Love,
Whom we, that have not seen thy
face.
By faith, and faith alone, embrace,
Believing where we cannot prove;
Thine are these orbs of light and
shade;
Thou madest life in man and brute,
Thou madest Death; and lo, thy
foot
Is on the skull which thou hast made.
Thou wilt not leave us in the dust:
Thou madest man, he knows not
why ;
He thinks he was not made to die ;
And thou hast made him: thou art
just.
Thou seemest human and divine,
Tlie highest, holiest manhood,
thou :
Our wills are ours, we know not
how ;
Our wills are ours, to make them
thine.
Our little systems have their day ;
They have their day and cease to be :
They are but broken lights of tliee.
And thou,0 Lord, art more than they.
We have but faith : we cannot know ;
For knowledge is of things we see:
And yet we trust it comes from
thee,
A beam in darkness: let it grow.
Let knowledge grow from more to
more,
But more of reverence in us dwell :
That mind and soul according well.
May make one music as before,
But vaster. We are fools and slight :
We mock thee when A\e do not
fear:
But help thy foolish ones to bear;
Help thv vain worlds to bear thy
light.
Forgive what seemed my sin in me:
A\ hat seemed my wortli since I
began ;
For merit lives from man to man.
And not from man, O Lord, to thee.
Forgive my grief for one removed,
Thy creature, whom I found so
fair,
I trust he lives in thee, and there
I find him worthier to be loved.
Forgive these Avild and wandering
cries,
Confusions of a wasted youth :
Forgive them Avhere they fail in
truth.
And in thy wisdom make me \\ise.
[From III Memoriam.]
HOPE FOR ALL.
Oil, yet we trust that somehow good
AVill be the final goal of ill.
To pangs of nature, sins of will,
Defects of doubt, and taints of blood :
That nothing walks, with aindess
feet;
That not one life shall be destroyed,
Or cast as rubbish to the void,
AVhen God hath made the pile com-
plete :
That not a worm is cloven in vain ;
That not a nioth with vain desire
Is slirivelled in a fruitless fire,
Or but subserves another's gain.
Behold we know not anything:
I can but trust that good shall fall
At last — far-off — at last, to all.
And every winter change to spring.
So runs my dream : but what am I ?
An infant crying in the night:
An infant crying for the light:
And with no language but a cry.
The wish, that of the living whole
No life may fail beyond the grave
Derives it not from wliat we have
The likest God within the soul ?
Are God and Nature then at strife,
That Nature lends such evil
dreams?
So careful of the type she seems,
So careless of the single life;
That I, considering everywhere
Her secret meaning in her deeds,
And finding that of fifty seeds
She often brings but one to bear,
1 falter where I firmly trod,
And falling with my weight of
cares
Upon the great world's altar-stairs
That slope through darkness up to
God,
I stretch lame hands of faith, and
grope,
And" gather dust and chaff, and
call
To what I feel is Lord of all,
And faintly trust the larger hope.
IFrom In Memoriam.']
SOUL TO SOUL.
I SHALL not see thee. Dare I say
No spirit ever brake the band
That stays him from the native
land.
Where first he walked when claspt in
clay ?
No visual shade of some one lost.
But he. the Spirit himself, may
come
Where all the nerve of sense is
numb
Spirit to spirit, ghost to ghost.
Oh, therefore from thy sightless
range
With gods in unconjectured bliss.
Oh, from the distance of the abyss
Of tenfold complicated change,
Descend, and touch, and enter: hear
The wish too strong for words to
name ;
That in this blindness of the frame
My ghost may feel that thine is near.
IFrom III Memoriam.]
COXDITION OF SPIRITUAL
COMMUNWX.
How pure at heart and sound in
head.
With what divine affections bold.
Should be the man whose thought
would hold
An hour's comnumion with the
dead.
In vain shalt thou, or any. call
The spirits from their golden day.
Except, like them, thou too canst
say.
My spirit is at peace with all.
They haunt the silence of the
breast.
Imagination calm and fair,
Theinemory like a cloudless ail-.
The conscience as a sea at rest :
But when the heart is full of din,
And Doubt beside the portal waits,
They can but listen at the gates,
And hear the household jar within.
[From In Mi inoi'han.]
FAITH I\ DOUBT.
Perplext in faith, but pure in deeds.
At last he beat his music out.
There lives more faith in honest
doubt.
Believe me, than in half the creeds.
He fought his doulits and gathered
strength.
He would not make his judgment
blind.
He faced the spectres of the mind
And laid tliem: thus he came at
length
570
TENNYSON.
To find a stronger faith his own :
And Power was witli him in the
night,
Wliicli makes the darkness and tlie
liglit,
And dwells not in tlie liglit alone.
But in the darkness and the cloud,
As over Sinai's peaks of old,
While Israel made their gods of
gold.
Although the trumpet blew so loud.
[From In Memoriam.]
TO A FRIEND IN HE A VEN.
Deak friend, far off, my lost desire,
So far, so near in woe and weal :
loved the most, when most I feel
There is a lower and a higher;
Known and unknown: human, di-
vine:
Sweet human hand and lips and
eye:
Dear heavenly friend that canst
not die,
Mine, mine, forever, ever mine;
Strange friend, past, present, and to
■"be:
Love deeplier, darklier understood :
Behold, I dream a dream of good.
And mingle all the world with thee.
Thy voice is on the rolling air:
1 hear thee where the waters run ;
Tliou standest in tlie rising sun.
And in the setting thou art fair.
What art tliou then ? I cannot guess ;
But though I seem in star and
(lower
To feel thee some diffusive power,
I do not therefore love thee less:
My love involves the love before :
My love is vaster passion now;
Though mixed with God and Na-
ture thou.
I seem to love thee more and more.
Far off thou art, but ever nigh :
I have thee still, and I rejoice:
I prosper, circled with thy voice:
I sliall not lose thee though I die.
{From In ^[emol^i<^m.}
liING OUT, WILD DELLS.
Ring out, Avild bells, to the wild sky,
Tlie flying cloud, the frosty light:
The year is dying in the niglit ;
Ring out, wild bells, and let iiini die.
Ring out the old, ring in the new.
Ring, happy bells, across the snow:
The year is going, let him go ;
Ring out the false,"ring in the true.
Ring out the grief that saps the mind.
For those that here we see no more :
Ring out the feud of rich and poor.
Ring in redress to all mankind.
Ring out a slowly dying cause.
And ancient forms of party strife :
Ring in the nobler modes of life,
With sweeter manners, purer laws.
Ring out the want, the care, the sin.
The faithless coldness of the times :
Ring out, ring out my mournful
rhymes,
But ring the fuller minstrel in.
Ring out false pride in place and
blood.
The civic slander and the spite ;
Ring in the love of truth and right.
Ring in the common love of good!
Ring out old shapes of foul disease:
Ring out the narrowing lust of gold ;
Ring out the thousand wars of old.
Ring in the thousand years of peace.
Ring in the valiant man ami free.
The larger heart, the kindlier hand:
Ring out the darkness of the land,
Ring in the Christ that is to be.
[From The Princess.]
TEARS, IDLE TEARS.
Tears, idle tears, I know not what
they mean,
Tears from the depth of some divine
despair
Rise in the heart, and gatlier to the
eyes.
In loolving on tlie happy autumn
fields.
And thinking of the days that are no
more.
Fresh as the first beam glittering
on a sail.
That brings our friends up from the
imderworld.
Sad as the last Avhich reddens over
one
That sinks with all we love below the
verge :
So sad, so fresh, the days that are no
more.
Ah, sad and strange as in dark
summer dawns
The earliest pipe of half-awakened
birds
To dying ears, T\'hen unto dying eyes
The casement slowly grows a glim-
mering square:
So sad, so strange, the days that are
no more.
Dear as remembered kisses after
death.
And sweet as those by hopeless fancy
feigned
On lips that are for others : deep as
love.
Deep as first love, and wild with all
regret :
O Death in Life, the days that are no
more.
[From The Princess.']
FOR HIS CHILD'S SAKE.
Home they brought her warrior dead :
She nor swooned, nor uttered cry:
All her maidens, watching, said,
" She must weep or she will die."
Then they praised him, soft and low,
Called iiim worthy to be loved.
Truest friend and noblest foe :
Yet she neither spoke nor moved.
Stole a maiden from her place.
Ijightly to the warrior stept,
Took the face-cloth from the face:
Yet she neither moved nor wept.
Rose a nurse of ninety years,
Set his child upon her knee —
Like summer tempest came
tears —
" Sweet my child, I live for thee."
her
[From The Princess.]
RECONCILIA TION.
As through the land at eve we went,
And plucked the ripest ears.
We fell out, my wife and I,
Oh, we fell out, I know not why,
And kissed again with tears.
For when we came where lies the
child
We lost in other years.
There above the little grave.
Oh, there above the little grave,
We kissed again witli tears.
[From The Princess.]
BUGLE SONG.
The splendor falls on castle walls
And snowy sununits old in story :
The long light shakes across the
lakes
And the wild cataract leaps in
glory.
Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes
flying.
Blow, bugle: answer, echoes, dying,
dying, dying.
Oh, hark, oh, hear! how thin and
clear.
And thinner, clearer, farther going !
Oh, sweet and far from cliff and scar
The horns of Ellland faintly blow-
ins!
578
TENNYSON.
Blow, let us hear the purple glens
replying:
Blow, bugle: answer echoes, dying,
dying, dying.
O love, they die in yon rich sky,
They faint on hill or field or river;
Our echoes roll from soul to soul.
And grow forever and forever.
Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes
flying,
And answer echoes, answer, dying,
dying, dying.
[From The Princess.]
NOW LIES THE EARTH.
Now lies the Earth all Danae to
the stars.
And all thy heart lies open unto me.
Now slides the silent meteor on,
and leaves
A shining furrow, as thy thoughts in
me.
Now folds the lily all her sweet-
ness up.
And slips into the bosom of the lake:
So fold thyself, my dearest, thou,
and slip
Into my bosom and be lost in me.
\_From The Princess.]
MAN AND WOMAN.
For woman is not undeveloped man,
But diverse: could we make her as
the man,
Sweet love were slain: his dearest
bond is this.
Not like to like, but like in difference.
Yet in the long years liker must they
grow:
The man be more of woman, she of
man :
He gain in sweetness and in moral
height.
Nor lose the wrestling thews that
throw the world ;
She mental breadth, nor fail in child-
ward care.
Nor lose the childlike in the larger
mind ;
Till at the last she set herself to man,
Like perfect music unto noble words:
And so these twain, upon the skirts
of Time.
Sit side by side, full-summed in all
their powers.
Dispensing harvest,sowing the To-be,
Self-reverent each and reverencing
each.
Distinct in individualities,
But like each other even as those
who love.
[From The Princess.]
CRADLE SONG.
Saveet and low, sweet and low,
Wind of the western sea.
Low, low. breathe and blow,
AVind of the western sea!
Over the rolling waters go.
Come from the dying moon, and
blow.
Blow him again to me:
While my little one, while my pretty
one sleeps.
Sleep and rest, sleep and rest,
Father will come to thee soon:
Rest, rest, on mother's breast.
Father will come to thee soon;
Father will come to his balie in the
nest.
Silver sails all out of the Avest
Under the silver moon:
Sleep, my little one, sleep, my pretty
one, sleep,
[From The Princess.]
ASK ME NO MORE.
Ask me no more: the moon may
draw the sea;
The cloud may stoop from heaven
and take the shape,
W^ith fold to fold, of mountain or
of cape :
But O too fond, Avhen have I an-
swered thee ?
Ask me no more.
TENNl'SON.
579
Ask me no more: What answer
should I give ?
I love not hollow cheek or faded
eye:
Yet, O my friend, I will not have
thee die !
Ask me no more, lest I should bid
thee live:
Ask me no more.
Ask me no more : thy fate and mine
are sealed :
1 strove against the stream and all
in vain:
Let the great river take me to the
main :
No more, dear love, for at a touch I
yield:
Ask me no more.
[From The MUler''s DaUfjhti'r.]
LOVE.
Love that hath us in the net,
Can he pass, and we forget ?
Many suns arise and set.
Many a chance the years beget.
Love the gift is Love the debt.
Even so.
Love is hurt with jar and fret.
Love is made a vague regret.
Eyes with idle tears are wet.
Idle habit links us yet.
What is love ? for we forget :
Ah, no! no!
[From The Miller's Daughter.]
HUSBAyn TO WIFE.
Look through mine eyes with thine.
True wife.
Round my true heart thine arms
entwine :
My other dearer life in life,
Look through my very soul with
thine!
Untouched with any shade of years.
May those kind eyes forever dwell!
They have not shed a many tears.
Dear eyes, since first I knew tliem
well.
Yet tears they shed : they had tlieir
part
Of sorrow: for when time was
ripe,
The still affection of tlie heart
Became an outward breathing type,
That into stillness passed again.
And left a want unknown before :
Although tlie loss that brought us
pain.
That loss but made us love the
more,
AVith farther lookings on. The kiss,
The woven aj-ms, seem but to be
Weak symbols of the settled bliss,
The comfort, I have found in tliee:
But that God bless thee, dear — who
wrought
Two sjiirits to one equal mind —
With blessings beyond hojie or
thought.
With blessings which no words
can find.
Arise, and let us wander forth.
To yon old mill across the wolds;
For look, the sunset, south and north,
Winds all the vale in rosy folds.
And fires your narrow casement
glass.
Touching the sullen pool below:
On the chalk-hill the bearded grass
Is dry and dewless, let us go.
[From. The Miller's Daughter.]
WHAT I WOULD BE.
It is the miller's daughter,
And she is grown so dear, so dear.
That 1 would be the jewel
That trembles at her ear:
For hid in ringlets day and night,
I'd touch her neck so warm and white.
And I would lie the girdle
About her dainty, dainty waist,
And her heai't would beat against me.
In sorrow and in rest:
And I should know if it beat right,
I'd clasp it round so close and tight.
580
TENNYSON.
And I would be the necklace,
And all day long to fall and rise
Upon her balmy bosom,
With her laughter or her sighs.
And I would lie so light, so light,
I scarce should be unclasped at night.
[From Merlin and Vivien.']
NOT AT ALL, OP, ALL IN ALL.
In Love, if Love be Love, if Love
be ours,
Faith and unfaith can ne'er be equal
powers ;
Unfaith in aught is want of faith in
all.
It is the little rift within the lute.
That by and by will make the music
mute.
And ever widening slowly silence ah.
The little rift within the lover's
lute
Or little pitted speck in garnered fruit,
That rotting inward, slowly moulders
all.
It is not worth the keeping: let
it go:
But shalfit ? answer, darling, answer,
no.
And trust me not at all or all in all.
\_From Maud.']
GARDEN SONG.
Come into the garden, Maud,
For the black bat, night, has flown,
Come into the garden, Maud,
I am here at the gate alone:
And the woodbine spices are wafted
abroad.
And the musk of the roses blown.
For a breeze of morning moves,
And the planet of Love is on high,
Beginning to faint in the light that
she loves
On a bed of daffodil sky,
To faint in the light of the sun that
she loves.
To faint in his light, and to die.
All night have the roses heard
The flute, violin, bassoon :
All night has the casement jessamine
stirred
To the dancers dancing in tune ;
Till a silence fell with the waking
bird,
And a hush with the setting moon.
I said to the lily, " There is but one
With whom she has heart to be
gay.
When will the dancers leave her
alone ?
She is weary of dance and play."
Now half to the setting inoon are
gone.
And half to the rising day ;
Low on the sand and loud on the
stone
The last wheel echoes away.
I said to the rose, '" The brief night
goes
In babble and revel and wine.
O young lord-lover, what sighs are
those.
For one that will never be thine ?
But mine, but nune," so I sware to
the rose,
" Forever and ever, mine."
And the soul of the rose went into
my blood,
As the nuisic clashed in the hall ;
And long by the garden lake I stood.
For I iieard your rivulet fall
From the lake to the meadow and on
to the wood,
Our wood, that is dearer than all;
From the meadow your walks have
left so sweet
That whenever a March wind sighs
He sets the jewel-print of your feet,
In violets blue as your eyes,
To the woody hollows in which we
meet
And the valleys of Paradise.
COME INTO THE GARDEN, MAUD.
Page 580.
TENNYSON.
581
The slender acacia would not shake
One long milk-bloom on the ti'ee;
The white lake-blossom fell into the
lake,
As the pimpernel dozed on the lea;
But the rose was awake all night for
yovu' sake,
Knowing your promise to me;
The lilies and roses were all awake.
They sighed for the dawn and thee.
Queen rose of the rosebud garden of
girls.
Come hither, the dances are done.
In gloss of satin and glimmer of
pearls.
Queen lily and rose in one;
Shine out, little head, sunning over
with curls,
To the flowers, and be their sun.
There has fallen a splendid tear
From the passion-flower at the gate.
She is coming, my dove, my dear;
She is coming, my life, my fate;
The red rose cries, '" She is near, she
is near;"
And th« white rose weeps, " She is
late;"'
The larkspur listens, "I hear, I
hear ; " '
And the lily whispers, " I wait."
She is coming, my own, my sweet;
Were it ever so airy a tread,
My heart would hear her, and beat,
AVere it earth in an earthy bed.
My dust would hear her, and beat.
Had I lain for a century dead:
Would start and tremble under her
feet.
And blossom in purple and red.
[From Maud.]
GO NOT, HAPPY DAY.
Go not, happy day.
From the shining fields,
Go not, happy day,
Till the maiden yields.
Eosy is the West,
Eosy is the South,
Eoses are her cheeks.
And a rose her mouth.
When the happy Yes
Falters from her lips.
Pass and blush the news
O'er the blowing ships.
Over blowing seas.
Over seas at rest,
Pass the happy news,
Blush it through the West,
Till the red man dance
By his red cedar-tree.
And the red man's babe
Leaj), beyond the sea.
Blush from West to East,
Blush from East to West,
Till the AVest is East,
Blush it through the West.
Eosy is the West,
Eosy is the South,
Eoses are her cheeks,
And a rose her mouth.
\_From, Gtiinevere.]
THE NUNS' SONG.
Late, late, so late! and dark the
night and chill !
Late, late, so late ! but we can enter
still.
Too late, too late! ye cannot enter
now.
No light had we: for that M-e do
repent :
And learning this, the bridegroom
will relent.
Too late, too late! ye cannot enter
now.
No light: so late! and dark and
chill the night;
Oh, let us in, that we may find the
light!
Too late, too late! ye cannot enter
now.
Have we not heard the bride-
groom is so sweet ?
Oh, let us in, though late, to kiss his
feet!
No, no, too late! ye cannot enter
now.
582
TENNYSON.
THE DEATH OF THE OLD YEAH.
Full knee-deep lies the winter snow,
And the winter winds are wearily
sighing:
Toll ye tlie church-bell sad and slow,
And tread softly and speak low,
For the old year lies a-dying.
Old year, you must not die :
You came to us so readily,
You lived with us so steadily,
Old year, you shall not die.
He lieth still ; he doth not move ;
He will not see the dawn of day.
He hath no other life above; [love.
He gave me a friend, and a true, true-
And the new year will take 'em away.
Old year, you must not go:
So long as you have been with us,
Such joy as you have seen with us.
Old year, you shall not go.
He frothed his bumpers to the brim;
A jollier year we shall not see;
But though his eyes are waxing dim,
And though his foes speak ill of him.
He was a friend to me.
Old year; you shall not die:
We did so laugh and cry with you,
I've half a mind to die with you,
Old year, if you must die.
He was full of joke and jest,
But all his merry quips are o'er.
To see him die across the waste
His son and heir doth lide post-haste,
But he'll be dead before.
Every one for his own.
The night is starry and cold, my
friend.
And the new year, blithe and bold,
my friend,
Comes up to take his own.
How hard he breathes ! over the snow
I heard just now the crowing cock.
The shadows flicker to and fro:
The cricket chirps: the light burns
low:
'Tis nearly twelve o'clock
Shaki' hands before you die.
Old year, we'll dearly rue for you:
What is it we can do for you ?
Speak out before you die.
His face is growing sharp and thin.
Alack ! our friend is gone.
Close up his eyes: tie up his chin:
Step from the corpse, and let him in
That standeth there alone,
And waiteth at the door.
- There's a new foot on the floor, my
friend.
And a new face at the door, my
friend,
A new face at the door.
A WELCOME TO ALEXAXDllA.
Sea-kings' daughter from over the
sea,
Alexandra!
Saxon and Norman and Dane are we,
But all of us Danes in our welcome
of thee,
Alexandra !
Welcome her, thunders of fort and
of fleet!
Welcome her, thundering cheer of
the street!
Welcome her, all things youthful and
sweet.
Scatter the blossom under her feet!
Break, happy land, into earlier flow-
ers!
Make music, O l)ird, in the new-bud-
ded bowers!
Blazon your mottoes of blessing and
prayer !
Welcome her, welcome her, all that
is ours !
Warble, O bugle, and trumpet, blare !
Flags, flutter out upon turrets and
towers !
Flames, on the windy headland flare!
Utter your jubilee, steeple and spire!
Clash, ye bells, in the meriy March
air!
Flash, ye cities, in rivers of fire!
Rush to the i-oof, sudden rocket, and
higher
Melt into the stars for the land's
desire !
Roll and rejoice, jubilant voice,
Roll as a ground-swell dashed on the
strand,
Roar as the sea when he welcomes
the land,
TENNYSON.
583
And welcome her, welcome the land's
desire,
The sea-kings' daughter, as happy as
fair,
Blissful bride of a blissful heir.
Bride of the heir of the kings of the
sea —
O joy to the people, and joy to the
throne,
Come to us, love us, and make us
your own,
For Saxon or Dane or Norman we,
Teuton or Celt or whatever we be.
We are each all Dane in our welcome
of thee,
Alexandra!
LADY CLARA VERB DE VERE.
Lady Clara Vere de Vere,
Of me you shall not win renown :
You thought to break a country
heart
For pastime, ere you went to
town.
At me you smiled, but un beguiled
I saw the snare, and I retired :
The daughter of a hundred earls,
You are not one to be desired.
Lady Clara Vere de Vere,
I know you proud to bear your
name.
Your pride is yet no mate for mine,
Too proud to care from whence I
came.
Nor would I break for your sweet
sake
A heart that doats on truer
charms.
A simple maiden in her flower
Is worth a hundred coats of arms.
Lady Clara Vere de Vere,
Some meeker pupil you must
find
For were you queen of all that is,
I could not stoop to such a mind.
You sought to prove how I could
love.
And my disdain is my reply.
The lion on your old stone gates
Is not more cold to you than I.
Lady Clara Vere de Vere,
You put strange memories in my
head ;
Nor thrice your branching limes have
blown
Since I beheld young Laurence
dead.
Oh, your sweet eyes, your low replies :
A great enchantress you may be :
But tliere was that across his throat
Which you had hardly cared to see.
Lady Clara Vere de Vere,
When thus he met his mother's
view,
She had the passions of her kind,
She spake some certain truths of
you.
Indeed I heard one bitter word
That scarce is fit for you to hear:
Her manners had not that repose
Which stamps the caste of Vere de
Vere.
Lady Clara Vere de Vere,
There stands a spectre in your hall:
The guilt of blood is at your door:
You changed a wholesome heart to
gall.
You held your course without re-
morse*
To make him trust his modest
worth,
And, last, yon fixed a vacant stare.
And slew him with your noble
birth.
Trust me, Clara Vere de Vere,
From yon blue heavens above us
bent
The grand old gardener and his wife
Smile at the claims of long descent.
Howe'er it be, it seems to me,
'Tis only noble to be good.
Kind hearts are more than coronets,
And simple faith than Norman
blood.
I know you, Clara Vere de Vere,
You pine among your halls and
towers :
The languid light of your proud eyes
Is wearied of the rolling hours.
584
TENNYSON.
In glowing health, with boundless
wealth.
But siclcening of a vague disease,
You know so ill to deal with time.
You needs must play such i^ranks
as these.
('lara, Clara Vere de Vere,
If Time be heavy on your hands,
Are there no beggars at your gate,
Nor any poor about your lands ?
Oh ! teach the orphan-boy to read,
Or teach the orphan-girl to sew.
Pray Heaven for a human heart.
And let the foolish yeoman go.
CHARGE OF THE LIGHT BRIGADE.
Half a league, half a league,
HaJf a league onA\'ard,
All in the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.
"Forward, the Light Brigade!
Charge for the guns! " he said.
Into the valley of Death
Ilode the six hundred.
" Forward, the Light Brigade!"
Was there a man dismayed ?
Not though the soldiers knew
Some one had blundered :
Theirs not to make reply.
Theirs not to reason why.
Theirs but to do and die,
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.
Cannon to right of them.
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon in front of them
Volleyed and thundered ;
Stormed at with shot and shell.
Boldly they rode and well.
Into the jaws of Death,
Into the mouth of Hell
Rode the six hundred.
Flashed all their sabres bare.
Flashed as they turned in air.
Sabring the gunners there.
Charging an army, while
All the world wondered :
Plunged in the battery-smoke,
Right throughthe line theybroke ;
Cossack and Russian
Reeled from the sabre-stroke
Shattered and sundered.
Then they rode back, but not.
Not the six hundred.
Cannon to right of them.
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon behind them,
Volleyed and thundered ;
Stormed at with shot and shell.
While horse and hero fell,
They that had fought so well
Came through the jaws of Death
Back from the mouth of Hell,
All that was left of them,
Left of six hundred.
When can their glory fade ?
Oh, the wild charge they made!
All the world wondered.
Honor the charge they made !
Honor the Light Brigade !
Noble six hundred !
BREAK, BREAK. BREAK.
Bp.kak. break, break.
On thy cold gray stones, O Sea I
And I would that my tongue could
utter
The thoughts that arise in me.
Oh, well for the fisherman's boy.
That he shouts with his sister at
play !
Oh, well for the sailor lad.
That he sings in his boat on the
bay!
And the stately ships go on
To their haven under the hill:
But oh, for the touch of a vanished
hand,
And the sound of a voice that is
still!
Break, break, break.
At the foot of thy crags, O Sea !
But the tender grace of a day that is
dead
Will never come back to me.
MOVE EASTWARD, HAPPY EARTH. I* COME NOT WHEN I AM DEAD.
Move eastward, happy earth, and
leave
Yon orange sunset waning slow:
From fringes of the faded eve,
O happy planet, eastward go:
Till over thy dark shoulder glow,
Thy silver-sister world, and rise
To glass herself in dewy eyes
That watch me from the glen below.
Ah, bear me with thee, lightly borne,
Dip forwai'd under starry light,
And move me to my marriage-morn.
And round again to happy night.
THE TEARS OF HE A VEN.
Heavex weeps above the earth all
night till morn.
In darkness weeps as all ashamed to
weep.
Because the earth hath made her state
forlorn
With self-wrought evil of unnum-
bered years.
And doth the fruit of her dishonor
reap.
And all the day heaven gathers back
hei' tears
Into her own blue eyes so clear and
deep.
And showering down the glory of
lightsome day,
Smiles on the earth's worn brow to
win her if she may.
Come not when I am dead.
To drop thy foolish tears upon my
grave,
To trample round my fallen head.
And vex the unhappy dust thou
wouldst not save.
There let the wind sweep and the
plover cry;
But thou go by.
Child, if it were thine error or thy
crime
I care no longer, being all unblest:
Wed whom thou wilt, but I am sick
of Time,
And I desire to rest.
Pass on, weak heart, and leave me
where I lie:
Go by, go by.
CIRC U MS TANCE.
Two children in two neighbor vil-
lages [leas:
Playing mad pranks along the healthy
Two strangers meeting at a festival :
Two lovers whispering by an orcliard
wall :
Two lives bound fast in one with
golden ease:
Two graves grass-green beside a gray
church-to^^'er
Waslied with still rains and daisy-
blossomed ;
Two children in one hamlet born and
bred : [to houi*.
So runs tire round of life from liour
William Makepeace Thackeray.
AT THE CHURCH-GATE.
Although I enter not.
Yet round about the spot,
Ofttimes I hover;
And near the sacred gate,
With longing eyes I wait,
Expectant of lier.
The minster-bell tolls out
Above the city's rout.
And noise and humming;
They've hushed the minster-bell,
Tlie organ 'gins to swell, —
She's coming, — coming!
586
THAXTEE.
My lady comes at last, *
I will not enter there.
Timid ami stepping fast,
To sully your pure prayer,
And hastening hither.
AVith thoughts unruly.
With modest eyes downcast;
She comes, — she's here, — she's past;
But suffer me to pace
May heaven go with lier!
Round the forbidden place,
lingering a minute.
Kneel undisturhed, fair saint.
Like outcast spirits who wait,
Pour out your praise or plaint
And s(!e, througli heaven's gate,
Meekly and duly ;
Angels within it.
\)
Celia Thaxter.
FAREWELL.
The crimson sunset faded into gray ;
Upon tlie murmurous sea the twi-
light fell ;
The last warm breath of the de-
licious day
Passed with a nuite farewell.
Above my head, in the soft purple
sky,
A wild note sounded like a shrill-
voiced bell;
Three gulls met, wheeled, and parted
with a cry
That seemed to say, '• Farewell!"
I watched them ; one sailed east, and
one soared west.
And one went floating south ; while
like a knell
That mournful cry the empty sky
possessed.
"Farewell, farewell, farewell!"
"Farewell!" I thought, it is the
earth's one speecli;
All human voices the sad chorus
swell ;
Though mighty love to heaven's high
gate may reach.
Yet must he say, "Farewell!"
The rolling world is girdled with the
sound.
Perpetually breathed from all who
dwell
Upon its bosom, for no place is found
Where is not lieard, " Farewell!"
" Farewell, farewell ! " — from wave
to wave 't is tossed,
From wind to wind : earth has one
tale to tell ;
All other sounds are dulled and
drowned and lost
In this one cry, " Farewell! "
DISCOXTEXT.
Therk is no day so dark
But through the murk some ray of
hope may steal.
Some blessed touch from heaven that
we might feel,
If we but chose to mark.
We shut the portals fast,
And tui-n the key and let no sunshine
in;
Yet to the worst despair that comes
through sin
God's light shall reach at last.
We slight our daily joy.
Make much of our vexations, thickly
set
Our path with thorns of discontent,
and fret
At our tine gold's alloy.
Till bounteous heaven might frown
At such ingratitude, and, turning,
lay
On our impatience, burdens that
would weigh
Our aching shoulders down.
We shed too many tears,
And sigh too sore, and yield us up to
woe,
As if God had not planned the way
we go
And counted out our years.
Can we not be content,
And lift our foreheads from the igno-
ble dust
Of these complaining lives, and wait
with trust.
Fulfilling heaven's intent ?
Must we have wealth and power,
Fame, beauty, all things ordered to
our mind ?
Nay, all these things leave happiness
behind !
Accept the sun and shower,
The humble joys that bless,
Appealing to indifferent hearts and
coki
With delicate touch, striving to reach
and hold
Our hidden consciousness ;
And see how everywhere
Love comforts, strengthens, helps,
and saves us all ;
What opportunities of good befall
To make life sweet and fair !
THE SUyniSE NEVER FAILED US
YET.
Upon the sadness of the sea
The sunset broods regretfully;
From the far lonely spaces, slow
Withdraws the wistful afterglow.
So out of life the splendor dies;
So darken all the happy skies;
So gathers twilight, cold and stern;
But overhead the planets burn;
And up the east another day
Shall cliase the bitter dark away ;
What though our eyes with tears be
wet ?
The sunrise never failed us yet.
The blush of dawn may yet restore
Our light and hope and joy once
more
Sad soul, take comfort, nor forget
That sunrise never failed us yet!
A MUSSEL-SHELL.
Why art thou colored like the even-
ing sky
Sorrowing for sunset ? Lovely dost
thou lie.
Bared by the washing of- the eager
brine.
At the snow's motionless and wind-
carved line.
Cold stretch the snows, cold throng
the Avaves, the wind
Stings sharp, — an icy fire, a touch
unkind, —
And sighs as if with passion of re-
gret.
The while I mark thy tints of violet.
O beauty strange ! O shape of perfect
grace,
Whereon the lovely waves of color
trace
The history of the years that passed
thee by.
And touched thee with the pathos of
the sky!
The sea shall crush thee; yea, the
ponderous wave
Up the loose beach shall grind, and
scoop thy grave.
Thou thought of God! What more
than thou am I ?
Both transient as the sad wind's pass-
ing sigh.
nE VEllIE.
The white reflection of the sloop's
great sail
Sleeps trembling on the tide.
In scarlet trim her crew lean o'er the
rail,
Lounging on either side.
588
THAXTER.
Pale blue and streaked with pearl the
waters lie,
And glitter in the lieat;
Tlie distance gatliers purple bloom
where sky
And glimmering coast-line meet.
From tlie cove's curving rim of sandy
gray
The ebbing tide has drained,
Where, mournful, in the dusk of
yesterday
The curlew's voice complained.
Half lost in hot mirage the sails afar
Lie dreaming, still and white;
No wave breaks, no wind breathes,
the peace to mar,
Summer is at its height.
How many thousand summers thus
have shone
Across the ocean waste.
Passing in swift succession, one by
one
By the fierce winter chased !
The gray rocks blushing soft at dawn
and eve,
The green leaves at tlieir feet,
The dreaming sails, the crying birds
that grieve.
Ever themselves repeat.
And yet how dear and how forever
fair
Is Nature's friendly face.
And how forever new and sweet and
rare
Each old familiar grace!
What matters it that she will sing
and smile
When we are dead and still ?
Let us be happy in her beauty while
Our hearts have power to thrill.
Let us rejoice in every moment
bright.
Grateful that it is ours ;
Bask in her smiles with ever fresh
delight.
And gather all her flowers ;
For presently we part: what will
avail
Her rosy fires of dawn.
Her noontide pomps, to us, who fade
and fail.
Our hands from hers withdrawn ?
LOVE SHALL SAVE US ALL.
O PILGRIM, comes the niglit so fast?
Let not the dark thy heart appall.
Though loom the shadows vague and
vast.
For love shall save us all.
There is no hope but this to see
Through tears that gather fast, and
fall ;
Too great to perish love must be,
And love shall save us all.
Have patience with our loss and
pain.
Our troubled space of days so
small ;
We shall not reach our arms in vain,
For love shall save us all.
O ]^ilgrim, but a moment wait.
And we shall hear our darlings
call
Beyond death's mute and awful gate,
And love shall save us all !
TO A VIOLIN.
What wondrous power from heaven
upon thee wrought '?
What prisoned Ariel within thee
broods ?
Marvel of human skill and human
thought,
Light as a dry leaf in the winter
woods !
Thou mystic thing, all beautiful!
What mind
Conceived thee, what intelligence
began
And out of chaos thy rare shape de-
signed.
Thou delicate and perfect work of
man ?
THAXTEB.
589
Across my hands thou liest mute and
still;
Thou wilt not breathe to me thy
secret fine;
Thy matchless tones the eager air
shall thrill
To no entreaty or command of
mine;
But comes thy master, lo ! thou yield-
est all :
Passion and pathos, rapture and
despair ;
To the soul's need thy searching
voice doth call
In language exquisite beyond com-
pare,
Till into speech articulate at last
Thou seem'st to break, and thy
charmed listener hears
Thee waking echoes of the vanished
past.
Touching the source of gladness
and of tears ;
And with bowed head he lets the
sweet wave roll
Across him, swayed by that weird
power of thine,
And reverence and wonder fill his
soul
That man's creation should be so
divine.
COURAGE.
Because I hold it sinful to despond.
And will not let the bitterness of
life
Blind me with burning tears, but
look beyond
Its tumult and its strife;
Because I lift my head above the
mist.
Where the sun shines and the
broad breezes blow,
By every ray and every rain-drop
kissed
That God's love doth bestow;
Think you I find no bitterness at all?
No burden to be borne, like Chris-
tian's pack ?
Think you there are no ready tears
to fall
Because I keep them back ?
Why should I hug life's ills with cold
reserve,
To curse myself and all who love
me? Nay!
A thousand times more good than I
deserve
God gives me every day.
And in each one of these rebellious
tears
Kept bravely back, He makes a
rainbow shine;
Grateful I take His slightest gift, no
fears
Nor any doubts are mine.
Dark skies must clear, and when the
clouds are jiast.
One golden day redeems a weary
year;
Patient I listen, sure that sweet at
last
Will sound his voice of cheer.
Then vex me not with chiding. Let
me be.
I must be glad and grateful to the
end;
I grudge you not your cold and dark-
ness, — me
The powers of light befriend.
IN KITTERY CHURCHYARD.
Crushing the scarlet strawberries in
the grass,
I kneel to reael the slanting stone.
Alas!
How sharp a sorrow speaks ! A hun-
dred years
And more have vanished, with their
sjniles and tears.
Since here was laid, upon an April
day,
Sweet Mary Chauncy in the grave
away, —
590
THAXTER.
A hundred years since here her lover
stood
Beside her grave iu such despairing
mood,
And yet from out the vanished past
I hear
His cry of anguish sounding deep
and clear,
And all my heart with pity melts, as
though
To-day's bright sun were looking on
his woe.
"Of such a wife, O righteous heav-
en! bereft.
What joy for me, what joy on earth
IS left ?
Still from my inmost soul the groans
arise.
Still flow the sorrows ceaseless from
mine eyes."
Alas, poor tortured soul ! I look
away
From the dark stone, — how brilliant
shines the day!
A low wall, over which the roses
shed
Their perfumed petals, shuts the
quiet dead
Apart a little, and the tiny square
Stands in the broad and laughing
field so fair,
And gay green vines climb o'er the
rough stone wall, '
And all about the wild-birds flit and
call.
And but a stone' s-throw southward.
the blue sea
Rolls sparkling in and sings inces-
santly.
Lovely as any dream the peaceful
place,
And scarc<;ly changed since on her
gentle face
For the last time on that sad April
day
He gazed, and felt, for him, all beauty
lay [him
liuried with her forever. Dull to
Looked the bright world through
eyes with tears so dim!
" I soon shall follow the same dreary
way
That leads and opens to the coasts
of day."
His only hope ! But when slow time
had dealt
Firmly with him and kindly, and he
felt
The storm and stress of strong and
piercing pain
Yielding at last, and he grew calm
again,
Doubtless he found another mate
before
He followed Maiy to the happy
shore I
But none the less his grief appeals to
me
Who sit and listen to the singing sea
This matchless summer day, beside
the stone
He made to echo with his bitter
moan,
And in my eyes I feel the foolish
tears
For bui'ied sorrow, dead a hundred
years !_
HEETHOVEN.
O SovERKKJN Master! stern and
splendid power,
That calmly dost both time and
death defy;
Lofty and lone as mountain peaks
that tower.
Leading our thoughts up to the
eternal sky:
Keeper of some divine, mysterious
key.
Raising us far above all human
care,
Unlocking awful gates of harmony
To let heaven's light in on ithe
world's despair;
Smiter of solemn chords that still
command
Echoes in souls that suffer and as-
pire,
In the great moment while we hold
thy hand,
Baptized with pain and rapture,
tears and lire,
God lifts our saddened foreheads
from the dust.
The everlasting God, in whom we
trust !
THOMSON.
591
THE SANDPIPER.
Across the narrow beach we flit,
One little sandpiper and I
And fast I gather, l)it by bit.
The scattered driftwood bleached
and dry
The wild waves reach their hands
for it, [high,
The wild wind raves, the tide runs
As up and down the beach we flit, —
One little sandpiper and I.
Above our heads the sullen clouds
Scud black and swift across the sky ;
Like silent ghosts in mistv shrouds'
Stand out the white lighthouses
high.
Almost as far as eye can reach
I see the close-reefed vessels fly,
As fast we flit along the beach,—
One little sandpiper and I.
I watch him as he skims along
Uttering his sweet and mournful
cry;
He starts not at my fitful song.
Or flash of fluttering drapery;
He has no thought of any wrong.
He scans me with a fearless eye ;
Stanch friends are Ave, well tried and
strong.
The little sandpiper and I.
Comrade, where wilt thou be to-night
When the loosed storm breaks furi-
ously ?
My driftwood fire will burn so bright!
To what warm shelter canst thou
fly''
I do not fear for thee, though wroth
The tempest rushes through the
sky :
For are we not God's children both.
Thou, little sandpiper, and I ?
James Thomson.
[From The Seasons.]
PURE AND HAPPY LOVE.
But happy they! the happiest of
their kind !
Whom gentler stars unite, and in one
fate
Their hearts, their fortunes, and
their beings blend.
'Tis not the coarser tie of human
laws.
Unnatural oft, and foreign to the
mind,
Tliat binds their peace, but harmony
itself,
Attuning all their passions into love;
Where Friendship full-exerts her
softest power.
Perfect esteem enlivened by desire
Ineffable, and sympathy of" soul;
Thought meeting thought, and will
preventing will,
With boimdless confidence: for
nought but love
Can answer love, and render bliss
secure.
[From The Seasons.]
THE TEMPEST.
Unusual darkness broods; and
growing, gains
The full possession of the sky, sur-
charged
With wrathful vapor, from the secret
beds.
Where sleep the mineral generations,
drawn.
Thence nitre, sulphur, and the fiery
spume
Of fat bitumen, steaming on the day.
With various-tinctured trains of
latent flame.
Pollute the sky, and in yon baleful
cloud,
A reddening gloom, a magazine of
fate,
Ferment; till, by the touch ethereal
roused.
The dash of clouds, or irritating
war
Of fighting winds, while all is calm
below,
592
THOMSON.
They furious spring. A boding si-
lence reigns,
Dread tlirougli tlie dun expanse ; save
the dull sound
That from the mountain, previous to
the storm.
Rolls o'er the muttering earth, dis-
turbs the flood,
And shakes the forest-leaf without a
breath.
Prone, to the lowest vale, the aerial
tribes
Descend: the tempest-loving raven
scarce
Dares wing the dubious dusk. In
rueful gaze
The cattle stand, and on the scowling
heavens
Casta deploring eye; by man forsook.
Who to tlie crowded cottage hies him
fast.
Or seeks the shelter of the downwai'd
cave.
'Tis listening fear, and dumb
amazement all :
When to the startled eye the sudden
glance
Appears far south, eruptive through
the cloud ;
And following slower, in explosion
vast.
The thunder raises his tremendous
voice.
At first, heard solemn o'er the verge
of heaven.
The tempest growls ; but as it nearer
comes,
And rolls its awful burden on the
wind,
The lightnings flash a larger curve,
and more
The noise astounds: till overhead a
sheet
Of livid flame discloses wide, then
shuts,
And opens wider; shuts and opens
still
Expansive, wrapping ether in a
blaze.
Follows the loosened aggravated roar,
Enlarging, deepening, mingling, peal
on peal
Crushed horrible, convulsing heaven
and earth.
Down comes a deluge of sonorous
hail.
Or prone-desconding rain. Wide rent,
the clouds
Pour a whole flood ; and yet its flame
unquenched.
The unconquerable lightning strug-
gles through.
Ragged and fierce, or in red whirling
balls,
And fires the mountains with re-
doubled rage.
[From The StasonsJ]
HARVEST-TIME.
A SEEENER blue,
With golden light enlivened, wide
invests
The happy world. Attempered suns
arise.
Sweet-beamed, and shedding oft
through lucid clouds
A pleasing calm; while broad and
brown, below
Extensive harvests hang the heavy
head.
Rich, silent, deep, they stand; for
not a gale
Rolls its light billows o'er the bend-
ing plain:
A calm of ploity ! till the ruffled air
Falls from its poise, and gives the
breeze to blow.
Rent is the fleecy mantle of the sky ;
The clouds fly different; and the
sudden sun
By fits effulgent gilds the illumined
field.
And black by fits the shadows sweep
along.
A gaily-chequered heart-expanding
view.
Far as the circling eye can shoot
around.
Unbounded tossing in a flood of corn.
These are thy blessings, industry!
rough power !
Whom labor still attends, and sweat,
and pain ;
Yet the kind source of every gentle
art.
And all the soft civility of life.
THOMSON.
598
[Frnm The Seasons.]
BIllDS, AND THEIR LOVES.
When first the soul of love is sent
abroad
Warm through the vital air, and on
the heart
Harmonious seizes, the gay troops
begin,
In gallant thought, to plume the
painted wing;
And try again the long-forgotten
strain.
At first faint-warbled. But no sooner
grows
The soft infusion prevalent, and wide,
Than, all alive, at once their joy o'er-
flows
In music uncoufined. Upsprings the
lark.
Shrill-voiced, and loud, the messen-
ger of morn ;
Ere yet the shadows fly, he mounted
sings
Amid the dawning clouds, and from
their haunts
Calls up the tuneful nations. Every
copse
Deep-tangled, tree irregular, and bush
Bending with dewy moisture, o'er
the heads
Of the coy quiristers that lodgewithln.
Are prodigal of harmony. The
thrush
And wood-lark, o'er the kind-con-
tending throng
Superior heard, run through the
sweetest length
Of notes; when listening Philomela
deigns
To let them joy, and purposes, in
thought
Elate, to make her night excel their
day.
The blackbird whistles from (he
thorny brake;
The mellow bullfinch answers from
the grove :
Nor are the linnets, o'er the flower-
ing furze
Poured out profusely, silent. .Joined
to these
Innumerous songsters, in the fresh-
ening shade
Of new-sprung leaves their modula-
tions mix
Mellifluous. The jay, the rook, the
daAv,
And each harsh pipe, discordant
heard alone.
Aid the full concert: while the stock-
dove breathes
A melancholy murnuu- through the
whole.
'Tis love creates their melody, and all
This waste of music is the voice of
love,
That even to birds, and beasts, the
tender arts
Of pleasing, teaches. Hence, the
glossy kind
Try every winning way inventive love
Can dictate, and in courtship to their
mates
Pour forth their little souls. First,
wide around.
With distant awe, in airy rings they
rove.
Endeavoring by a thousand tricks to
catch
The cunning, conscious, half-averted
glance
Of their regardless charmer. Should
she seem
Softening the least appro vance to be-
stow.
Their colors burnish, and by hojie
inspired,
They brisk advance; then, on a suil-
den struck.
Retire disordered; then again ap-
proach ;
In fond rotation spread the spotted
wing.
And shiver every feather with desire.
[From The Seafions.]
DEATH AMID THE SXOIVS.
Ai,i. Minter drives along the dark-
ened air:
In his own loose revolving fields, tlie
swain
Disastered stands; sees other hills
ascend.
Of unknown joyless brow; and other
scenes
594
THOMSON.
Of horrid prospect, shag the trackless
plain ;
Nor finds the river, nor the forest,
hid
Beneath the formless wild; but wan-
ders on
From hill to dale, still more and
more astray ;
lmi)atient flouncing tln'ough the
drifted heaps,
Stung with the tlioughts of home;
the thoughts of home
Rush on his nerves, and call their
vigor fortli
In many a vain attempt. How sinks
his soul!
What black despaii', wliat horror fills
his heart!
When for the dusky spot, which
fancy feigned
His tufted cottage rising through the
snow,
He meets the roughness of the middle
waste.
Far from the track and blest abode
of man;
While round him night, resistless,
closes fast.
And every tempest, howling o'er his
head, [wild.
Renders the savage wilderness more
Then throng the busy shapes into
his mind,
Of covered pits, imfathomably deep,
A dire descent! beyond the power of
frost ;
Of faithless bogs ; of precipices huge.
Smoothed up with snow; and, what
is land, unknown.
What water, of the still unfi-ozen
spring.
In the loose marsh or solitary lake.
Where the fresh fountain from the
bottom boils.
These check his fearful steps; and
down he sinks,
Beneath the shelter of the shapeless
drift.
Thinking o'er all the bitterness of
death ;
Mixed with the tender anguish na-
tiu'e shoots
Through the wrung bosom of the
dying man.
His wife, his children, and his friends
unseen.
In vain for him the officious wife
prepares
The fire fair-blazing, and the vest-
ment warm;
In vain his little children, peeping
out
Into the mingling storm, demand
their sire,
With tears of artless innocence.
Alas!
Nor wife, nor cliildren more shall he
behold.
Nor friends, nor sacred home. On
every nerve
The deadly winter seizes; shuts up
sense ;
And, o'er his inmost vitals creeping
cold.
Lays him along the snows, a stiffened
corse,
Stretched out, and bleaching in the
northern blast.
[FromLiU'i-fi/.l
IKDEPENDEXCE.
Hail! Independence, hail! Heav-
en's next best gift.
To that of life and an immortal
soul !
The life of life! that to the banquet
high
And sober meal gives taste; to the
bowed roof
Fair-dreamed repose, and to the cot-
tage charms.
\From Libcrtij.]
A STATE'S NEED OF VIRTUE.
.... Virtue! without thee,
Theie is no ruling eye, no nerve, in
states ;
War has no vigor, and no safety,
peace :
E'en justice wai-ps to party, laws op-
l)ress.
Wide through the land their weak
protection fails.
First broke the balance, and then
scorned the sword.
THOMSON.
;)!);■)
[FroTn Liber-ti/.]
THE ZEAL OF J'EUSECUTION.
Mother of tortures! persecuting
Zeal,
High flashing in her hand the ready
torch,
Or poniard bathed in unbelieving
blood;
Hell's fiercest fiend! of saintly brow
demure.
Assuming a celestial serapli"s name.
While she beneath the blasphemous
pretence
Of pleasing Parent Heaven, the
Source of Love,
Has wrought more horrors, more
detested deeds,
Than all the rest combined !
[ From Liberty.]
THE APOLLO, AND VENUS OF
MEDICI.
Ax.L conquest-flushed, from pros-
trate Python, came
The (luivered god. In graceful act
he stands.
His arm extended with the slackened
bow ;
Light flows his easy robe, and fair
displays
A manly softened form. The bloom
of gods
Seems youthful o'er the beardless
ciieek to wave:
His features yet. lieroic ardor warms;
And sweet subsiding to a native
smile.
Mixed with the joy elating conquest
gives,
A scattered frown exalts his match-
less air.
The Queen of Love arose, as from
the deep
.She sprung in all the melting pomp
of charms.
Bashful she bends, her well-taught
look aside
Turns in enchanting guise, where
dubious mix
Vain conscious beauty, a dissembled
sense
Of modest shame, and slippery looks
of love.
The gazer grows enamoured, and the
stone.
As if exulting in its conquest, smiles.
So turned each limb, so swelled with
softening art,
That the deluded eye the marble
doubts.
[From The Castle of Indolence.]
REPOSE.
What, what is virtue, but repose of
mind,
A pure ethereal calm, that knows ]io
storm ;
Above the reach of wild ambition's
wind.
Above those passions that this world
deform,
And torture man, a proud malignant
Avorm?
But here, instead, soft gales of pas-
sion play,
And gently stir the heart, thereby to
form
A quicker sense of joy; as breezes
stray
Across the enlivened skies, and make
them still more gay.
The best of men have ever loved re-
pose:
They hate to mingle in the filthy
fray.
Where the soul sours, and gradual
rancor grows.
Embittered more from peevish day to
day.
E'en those whom fame has lent her
fairest ray.
The most renowned of worthy wights
of yore,
From a base world at last have
stolen away:
So Scipio, to the soft Cuma^an shore
Retiring, tasted joy he never knew
before.
596
THOMSON.
[From The Castle of Indolence.]
THE POLL Y OF HOARDIXG.
On, grievous folly! to heap up estate,
Losing the days you see beneath the
sun ;
When, sudden, comes blind unrelent-
ing fate,
And gives the untasted portion you
have won
With ruthless toil, and many a wretch
undone.
To those who mock you, gone to
Pluto's reign.
There with sad ghosts to pine, and
shadows dun:
But sure it is of vanities most vain.
To toil for what you here untoiling
may obtain.
[From The Castle of Indolence.]
EXCESS TO BE AVOIDED.
Bi'T not e'en pleasvire to excess is
good :
What most elates, then sinks the
soul as low :
When springtide joy pours in with
copious tlooil.
The higher still the exulting billows
flow.
The further back again they flagging
go,
And leave us grovelling on the dreai-y
shore.
[From The Castle of Indolence.]
NATUnE'S JOY INALIENABLE.
I (ARE not, Fortxane, what you me
deny:
You cannot rob me of free Nature's
grace ;
You cannot shut the windows of the
sky.
Through which Aurora shows her
brightening face ;
You cannot bar my constant feet to
trace
The woods and lawns, by living
stream, at eve;
Let health my nerves and finer fibres
brace.
And I their toys to the great children
leave:
Of fancy, reason, virtue, nouglit can
me bereave.
[From The Castle of Indolence.]
THE STATE OF THE WORLD HAD
MEN LIVED AT EASE.
Had unambitious mortals minded
nought.
But in loose joy their time to wear
away ;
Had they alone the lap of dalliance
sought.
Pleased on her pillow their dull heads
to lay,
Rude nature's state had been our
state to-day;
No cities e'er their to wery fronts had
raised,
Xo arts had made us opulent and
gay;
With brother brutes the human race
had grazed ;
None e'er had soar'd to fame, none
honored been, none praised.
Great Homer's song had ne\er fired
the breast
To thirst of glory, and heroic
deeds;
Sweet Maro's muse, sunk in inglori-
ous rest.
Had silent slept amid the Mincian
reeds :
The wits of modern time had told
their beads.
The monkish legends been their only
strains;
Our Milton's Eden had lain wrapt in
weeds.
Our Shakespeare strolled and laughed
with Warwick swains,
Ne had my master Spenser charm'd
his Mulla's plains.
THOMSON.
597
[From The Castle of Indolence.]
HEALTH NECESSARY TO HAPPY
LIFE.
All! what avail the largest gifts of
Heaven,
When drooping health and spirits go
amiss?
How tasteless then whatever can be
given?
Health is the vital principle of
bliss,
And exercise of health. In proof of
this.
Behold the wretch, who slugs his life
away.
Soon swallowed in disease's sad
abyss ;
Willie he whom toil has braced, or
manly play,
As light as air each limb, each thought
as clear as day.
Oh, who can speak the vigorous joys
of health !
Unclogg'd the body, unobscured the
mind :
The morning rises gay, with pleasing
stealth.
The temperate evening falls serene
and kind.
In health the wiser brutes true glad-
ness find :
See! how the younglings frisk along
the meads.
As May conies on, and wakes the
balmy wind ;
Kampant with life, their joy all joy
exceeds ;
Yet what but high-strung health this
dancing pleasaunce breeds?
COXTEXTMF.XT.
If those, who live in shepherd's
bower.
Press not the rich and stately bed :
The new-mown hay and breathing
flower
A softer couch beneath them
spread.
If those, who sit at shepherd's board,
Soothe not their taste by wanton
art ;
They take what Nature's gifts afford.
And take it with a cheerful heart.
If those who drain the shepherd's
bowl.
No high and sparkling wines can
boast.
With wholesome cups they cheer the
soul.
And crown them with the village
toast.
If those who join in shepherd's sport.
Gay dancing on the daisied ground.
Have not the splendor of a court :
Yet love adorns the merry round.
RULE, BRITANXIA!
When Britain first, at Heaven's
command,
Arose from out the azure main.
This was the charter of the land,
And guardian angels sung this
strain:
Rule, Britannia, I'ule the
waves ;
Britons never will be slaves.
The nations, not so blessed as thee.
Must, in their turns, to tyrants
fall;
While thou shalt flourish great and
free.
The dread and envy of them all.
Ilule, etc.
Still more majestic shalt thou rise.
More dreadful from each foreign
stroke ;
As the loud blast that tears the skies
Serves but to root thy native oak.
Rule, etc.
Thee haughty tyrants ne'er shall
tame :
All their attempts to bend thee
down
598
TIL TON.
Will but arouse thy generous flame,
But work tlieir woe, and thy re-
nown.
Rule, etc.
To thee belongs the rural reign;
Thy cities shall with commerce
shine :
All thine shall be the subject main :
And every shore it circles thine.
Rule, etc.
The Muses, still with freedom found.
Shall to thy happy coast repair:
Blessed isle! with matchless beauty
crowned,
And manly hearts to guard the
fair:
Rule, Britannia, rule the
waves ;
Britons never will be slaves.
Theodore Tilton.
[From Thou nml /.]
LOVE IN AGE.
For us, the almond-tree
Doth flourish now:
Its whitest bloom is on our brow.
Let others triumph as they may
And wear their garlands gay
Of olive, oak, or bay:
Our crown of glory is, instead,
The hoary head.
Our threescore years and ten.
That measure life to mortal men,
Have lingered to a longer length
By reason of oui- strength ;
Yet, like a tale that hath been told,
They all have passed, and now, be-
hold!
We verily are old ; —
Yea, old like Abraham, when he went,
AVith head down bent.
And mantle rent,
In dole for her who lay in death,
And to the Sons of Heth
The silver shekels gave
For Mamre's gloomy cave.
To be her grave; —
Or, older still, like him
Who, feeble not of limb,
With eyes not dim,
Upclimbed, with staff in hand.
To where Mount Nebo cleft the sky,
And looked and saw the Promised
Land
(Forbidden him from on high)
Till, with an unrecorded cry,
He laid him down to die.
So too, for us, the end is nigh.
Our mortal race is nearly run;
Our earthly toil is nearly done!
Ah, thou and I,
Who in tbe grave so soon shall lie,
Have little time to see the sun —
So little it is nearly none!
What then ?
Amen !
All hail, my love, good cheer!
Keep back thy unshed tear!
Not thou nor I
Shall mourn or sigh.
Nay now, we twain —
Old man, olil wife.
The few days tliat remain —
Let us make merry — let us laugh ! —
For now at length we quaff
The last, best wine of life, —
The very last — the very best.
The double cup of love and rest.
What though the groaning world
declare
That life is but a load of care ? —
A burden wearisome to bear ? —
That as we journey down the years.
The path is through a vale of tears ? —
Yet we who have the burden borne,
And travelled until travel-worn,
Forget the weight upon the Ijack,
Forsret the lou'^ and wearv track,
And sit remembering here to-day
How we were children at our play: —
And half in doze, at idle ease,
Before the hearth-tire's dying brands,
With elbows on our trembling knees,
With chin between our wrinkled
liands,
We sail unnavigable seas, —
We roam impenetrable lands, —
We leap from cUme to clime, —
We conquer space and time.
And, howsoever strange it seems,
The dearest of our drowsy dreams
Is of that billow-beaten shore
Where, in our childish days of yore.
We piled the salty sands
Into a palace that still stands ! —
Not where it first arose.
Not where the wild wind blows,
Not by the ocean's roar, —
(For, long ago, those turrets fell
Beneath that billowy swell), —
But. down within the heart's deep
core.
Our tumbled tower we oft restore
And ever build it o'er and o'er!
We have one palace more, —
Not made with hands, —
Nor liave our feet yet entered at its
door !
It lieth not behind us, but before!
Dear love, our pilgrimage is thither
tending.
And there shall have its ending!
Ah, tbough the rapturous vision
Allures us to a Land Elysian.
Yet aged are our feet, and slow.
And not in haste to go.
Life still hath many joys to give,
Whereof tlie sweetest is — to live.
'I'ben fear we death ? Not so 1
Or do we tremble ? No!
Nor do we even grieve!
And yet a gentle sigh we heave.
And unto Him who fixes fate, —
Witbout whose sovereign leave,
Down-whispered from on high,
Not even the daisy dares to die, —
We, jointly, thou ami L
Implore a little longer date, —
A little term of kind reprieve, —
A little lease till by and by!
May it be Heaven's decree, —
Here, now, to tliee and me, —
That, for a season still,
Tiie eye shall not grow dim;
That, for a few more days.
The ear cease not to hear the hyiini
Which the tongue utters to His
praise ;
That, for a little while.
The heart faint not, nor fail;
For even the wintry sun is bright,
And clieering to our aged sight;
Yea. though the frosts prevail,
Yet even the icy air.
The frozen plain, the leafiess wood
fetill keep the earth as fresh and
fair
As when from Heaven, He called it
good !
O final Summoner of the soul!
Grant, of thy pitying grace,
That, for a little longer space.
The pitcher at the foimtain's rim
Be shattered not, but still kept
whole, —
ytill overflowing at the brim!
If but a year, if but a day,
Thy lifted hand, O stay!
Loose Thou not yet, O Lord,
The silver cord !
Bi'eak Thou not yet the golden
bowl !
[From Thou and I.]
I'XDEU THE SOD.
" Thott and I!"
The voice no longer said;
BtU. two white stones, instead,
Above the twain, long dead.
Still utter, each to each.
The same familiar speech,
"Tliouand I!" —
600
TIL TON.
Not spoken to the passer-by,
But just as if, beneath the grass.
Deep under foot of all who pass,
The sleeping dust should wake to say.
Each to its fellow-clay,
Each in the same old way,
"Thou and l!"
And each to either should reply, —
(Tomb munniu'ing unto tomb.
Stone answering unto stone,
Yet not with sound of human moan.
Nor breath of mortal sigh.
But voiceless as the dead's dumb
cry. ) —
"Thou and I!"
" The spirit and the body part,
Yet love abideth, heart to heart.
" O silent comrade of my rest.
With hands here crossed upon thy
breast,
I know thee who thou art!
marble brow.
Here pillowed next to mine,
1 know the soul divine
That tenanted thy shrine !
" For, though above us, green and
high,
The yew-trees grow.
And churchyard ravens fly.
And mourners come and go.
Yet thou and I,
"Who dust to dust lie here below.
Still one another know!
" Yea, thee I know — it still is thou;
And me thou know'st — it still is I;
True lovers once, true lovers now! —
The same old vow.
The same old thrill,
The same old love between us still !
" The gloomy grave hath frosts that
kill.
But love is chilled not with their
chill.
" Love's flame —
Consuming, iniconsumed —
In breasts that breathe — in hearts
entombed —
Is fed by life and death the same!
"Love's spark
Is brightest when lovt
; house is dark!
■' Love's shroud —
That wraps its bosom round —
Must crumble in the cliarnel ground,
Till all the long white winding-sheet
Shall drop to dust from head to feet:
But love's strong ccrd.
The eternal tie,
The immortal bond that binds
Love's twain immortal minds; —
This silken knot
Shall never I'ot —
Nor moulder in the mouldy mound —
Nor mildew — nor decay —
Nor fall apart — nor drop away —
Nor ever be unbound !
" Love's dust.
Whatever grave it fill.
Though buried deep, is deathless still !
Love hath no death, and cannot die!
This love is ours, as here we lie, —
Thou and I! "
THE FOUl! SEASOXS.
In the balmy April weather.
My love, you know.
When the corn began to grow,
What walks we took together.
What sighs we breathed together.
What vows we pledged together.
In the days of long ago!
In the golden summer weather,
My love, you know.
When the mowers went to mow.
What home we built together.
What babes we watched together,
W'hat plans we planned togetlier,
\Vhile the skies were all aglow !
In the rainy autumn weather.
My love, you know.
When the winds began to blow.
What tears we shed together.
What mounds we heaped together.
What hopes we lost together,
When we laid our darlings low !
TIL TON.
In the wild and wintry weather.
My love, you know,
With our heads as white
snow,
What prayers we pray together.
What fears we share together.
What Heaven we seek together.
For our time has come to go!
Sin MAliMADUKE'S MUSINGS.
I WON a noble fame ;
But, with a sudden frown.
The people snatched my crown.
And, in the mire, trod down
My lofty name.
I bore a bounteous purse ;
And beggars by the way
Then blessed me, day by day :
But I, grown poor as they,
Have now tlieir curse.
I gained what men call friends :
But now their love is hate,
And I have learned, loo late.
How mated minds unmate,
And friendship ends.
I clasped a woman's breast, —
As if her heart, I knew.
Or fancied, would be true, —
Who proved, alas! she too!
False like the rest.
1 now am all bereft, —
As when some tower doth fall.
With battlement, and wall.
And gate, and bridge, and all,—
And nothing left.
But I account it worth
All pangs of fair hopes crossed -
All loves and honors lost, —
To gain the heavens, at cost
Of losing earth.
So, lest I be inclined
To render ill for ill, —
Henceforth in nie instil,
O God, a sweet good will
To all mankind.
RECOMPENSE.
The Temple of the Lord stood open
wide,
And worshippers went up from many
lands.
Who, kneeling at the altar, side by
side.
Made votive offerings with uplifted
hands.
Their gifts were gold, and frankin-
cense, and myrrh.
Then, with a lustrous gleam anil rap-
turous stir,
While all the people trembled and
turned pale.
There flew an angel to the altar-rail,
Who, with anointed eyes, keen to
discern.
Gazed, noting all the kneelers, m ho
they were.
And what was each one's tribute to
the Lord, —
And, gift for gift, with sudden, swift
return.
Bestowed on every suppliant his re-
ward.
O mocking recompense! To one, a
spear !
To many, each a thorn! To some a
nail !
To all, a cross! But unto none a
crown !
At last, they saw the angel disappeai-.
Then, as their timid hearts shook oft"
their fear,
Some rose in anger, flung their treas-
ures down.
And cried, '"Such gifts from Heaven
as these, we spui'u !
They are too cruel, and too keen to
bear !
They arc too grievous for a human
breast !
Heaven sends us heartache, misery,
and despair!
We knelt for blessing, but we rise un-
blest !
If Heaven so mock us, Ave will cease
to pray!"
They left the altar, and they went
their way ;
But their blaspheming hearts were
then self-torn
6(12
TRENCH.
Far more by pride, and heaven-defy-
ing scorn,
'I'lian pierced before by nail, or spear,
or tliorn I
A few (not many!) with their brows
down bent,
(Jave tlianivs for each sharp gift that
Heaven liad sent, —
And eacli embraced his separate pain
and sting.
As if it were some sweet and pleasant
thing, —
And each his cross, with joyful tears,
did take.
To bear it for the great Cross-bearer's
sake.
Then lo! as from the Temple forth
they went.
Their bleeding bosoms, though with
anguish rent.
Had, spite of all their pain ! — a sweet
content;
For on each brow, though not to mor-
tal sight.
The vanished angel left a croM-n of
light!
THE TWO LADDERS.
BKNioirn;() in my pilgrimage, —
alone, —
And footsore — (for the path to
heaven grew steep, ) —
I looked for Jacob's pillow of a stone.
In hope of Jacob's vision in my
sleep.
Then, in my dream, whereof 1 (piake
to tel'l,—
Not up from earth to heaven, but,
oh, sad sight!
The ladder was let down from earth
to hell !—
Whereon, ascending from the deep
abyss.
Came fiery spirits who, with dismal
hiss.
Made woeful clamor of their lost de-
light.
And stung my eyelids open, till, in
fright,
I caught my staff, and at the dead of
night,
I, who toward heaven and peace
had halted so.
AVas i!eet of foot to flee from hell
and woe!
Richard Chenevix Trench.
THliKE SONNETS ON PRAYER
liORD, what a change within us one
short hour
Spent in Thy presence will prevail to
make —
What heavy burdens from our bosoms
take.
What parched grounds refresh, as
with a shower!
We kneel, and all around us seems to
lower;
We rise, and all, the distant and the
near,
Stands forth in sunny outline, brave
and clear;
We kneel how weak, we rise how full
of power!
Why, therefore, should we do our-
selves this wrong,
Or others — that we are not always
strong;
That we are ever overborne with
care ;
That we should ever weak or heaiL-
less be.
Anxious or troubled, when with us is
prayer.
And joy, and strength, and courage,
aie with Thee ?
A GAIJDKN so well watered before
morn
Is hotly up, that not the swart sun's
blaze.
Down beating with unmitigated rays,
Nor arid winds from scorching places
borne,
Shall quite prevail to make it bare
and shorn
Of its green beauty — shall not quite
prevail
That all its morning freshness sliall
exliale,
Till evening and the evening dews
return —
A blessing such as this our hearts
niight reap,
The freshness of the garden they
might share,
Through the long day a heavenly
freshness keep.
If, knowing how the day and the
day's glare
Must beat upon them, we would
largely steep
And water them betimes with dews
of prayer.
WiiKx hearts are full of yearning
tenderness.
For the loved absent, whom we can
not reach —
By deed or token, gesture or kind
speech.
The spirit's true affection to express;
When hearts are full of innermost
distress, |by,
And we are doomed to stand inactive
Watching the soul's or body's agony.
Which human effort helps not to
make less —
Then like a cup capacious to contain
The overflowings of the heart, is
prayer:
The longing of the soul is satisfied,
The keenest darts of anguish blunted
are;
And, tbough we can not cease to
yearn or grieve,
Yet we have learned in patience to
abide.
LOllI), MAXY TIMES I AM A irEAni'.
J^oRD, many times I am aweary
quite
Of mine own self, my sin, my
vanity —
Yet be not Thou, or 1 am lost out-
right,—
Weary of me.
And hate against myself I often bear.
And enter with myself in fierce
debate :
Take Thou my part against myself,
nor share
In that just hate!
Best friends might loathe us, if what
tilings perverse
We know of our own selves, they
also knew:
Lord, Holy One! if Thou who knuw-
est worse
Shouldst loathe us too !
[From Lines to a Frietul.]
WEAK COXSOLA TIOX.
On, miserable comfort! Loss is loss,
And death is death; and after all is
done —
After the flowers are scattered on the
tomb,
After the singing of the sweetest
dirge —
The mourner, with his heart uncom-
forted,
Retm-ning to his solitary home.
Thinks with himself, if any one had
aught
Of stronger consolation, lie should
speak;
If not, 'twere best for ever to liold
peace.
And not to mock him with vain
words like these.
SADXESS BOnX OF BEAUTY.
All beautiful things bring sadness,
nor alone
Music, whereof that wisest poet
spake ; *
Because in us keen longings they
awake
After the good for which we pinc^ and
groan.
From which exiled we make continual
moan,
♦ I am never merry when I hear sweet
music. — SHAKliSPKAKK.
6U4
TRENCH.
Till once again we may our spirits
slake
At those clear streams, which man
did first forsake.
When he would dig for fountains of
liis own.
All beauty makes us sad, yet not in
vain —
For who would be ungracious to re-
fuse.
Or not to use, this sadness without
pain,
Whether it flows upon us from the
hues
Of sunset, from the time of stars
and dews,
From the clear sky, or waters pure of
stain '.'
THE LENT JEWELS.
In schools of wisdom all the day was
spent :
His steps at eve the Rabbi homeward
bent.
With homeward thoughts, which
dwelt upon the wife
And two fair child i-en who consoled
his life.
She, meeting at the thresliold, led
him in,
And with these words preventing,
did begin: —
" Ever rejoicing at your wished re-
turn.
Yet am 1 most so now: for since this
morn
1 liave been much perplexed and
sorely tried
Upon one point which you shall now
decide.
Some years ago, a friend into my
care
Some jewels gave — rich, precious
gems they were ;
But having given them in my cliarge.
this friend
Did afterward nor come for them, nor
send.
But left them in ray keeping for so
long.
That now it almost seems to me a
wrong
That he should suddenly arrive to-
day,
To take those jewels, which he left,
away.
What think you? Shall I freely
yield them back.
And with no murmuring ? — so hence-
forth to lack
Those gems myself, which I had
learned to see
Almost as mine for ever, mine in
fee."
"What question can be here?
Your own true heait
Must neeils advise you of the only
part :
That may be claimed again which
was but lent.
And should be yielded with no dis-
content.
Nor surely can we find herein a
wrong.
That it wasleft us to enjoy it long."
" Good is the word," she answered ;
" may we now
And evermore that it is good allow!"
And, rising, to an inner chamber led,
And thereshe showed him, stretched
upon one bed,
Two children pale: and he the jewels
knew,
AVhich God had lent him, and re-
sumed anew.
PA TIEXCE.
Be patient! oh, be patient! Put your
ear against the earth ;
Listen there how noiselessly the germ
o' tlie seed has birth —
How noiselessly and gently it up-
lieaves its little way.
Till it parts the scarcely broken
ground, and the blade stands
up in the day.
Be patient! oh, be patient! The
germs of mighty thought
Must have their silent imdergrowth,
must luiderground be wrought;
TRENCH.
605
But as sure as there's a power that
makes the grass appear,
Our land shall he green with liberty,
the blade-time shall be here.
Be patient! oh, be patient — go and
watch the wheat ears grow —
So imperceptibly that ye can mark
nor change nor throe —
Day after day, day after day, till the
ear is fully grown,
And then again day after day, till the
ripened field is brown.
Be patient! oh, be patient! — though
yet our hopes are green,
The harvest-fields of freedom sliall
be crowned with sunny sheen.
Be ripening! be ripening! — mature
your silent way.
Till the whole broad land is tonguetl
with tire on freedom's harvest
day!
HAPPINESS IN LITTLE TIHXGS
OF THE PRESENT.
We live not in our moments or our
years :
The present we fling from us like the
rind
Of some sweet future, which we after
find
Bitter to taste, or bind that in with
fears.
And water it beforehand with our
tears —
Vain tears for that which never may
arrive ;
Meanwhile the joy whereby we ought
to live.
Neglected, or imheeded, disappears.
Wiser it were to welcome and make
ours
Whate'er of good, though small, the
present brings —
Kind greetings, sunshine, song of
birds, and flowers.
With a child's pure delight in little
things;
And of the griefs unborn to rest se-
cure.
Knowing that mercy ever will endure.
THE ERMINE.
To miry places me the hunters drive.
Where I my robes of purest white
must stain;
Then yield I, nor for life will longer
strive.
For spotless death, ere spotted life,
is gain.
THE BEES.
We light on fruits and flowers, and
purest things;
For if on carcases or aught vmclean.
When homeward we returned, with
mortal stings
Would slay us the keen watchers
round our queen.
THE NIGHTINGALE.
Leaning my bosom on a pointetl
thorn,
I bleed, and bleeding sing my
sweetest strain:
For sweetest songs of saddest liearts
are born,
And who may here dissever love
and pain ?
THE SNAKE.
Myself I force some narrowest pas-
sage through,
Leaving my old and wrinkled skin
behind,
And issuing forth in splendor of my
new :
Hard entrance into life all creatures
find.
THE TIGER.
Hearing sweet music, as in fell de-
spite,
Himself the tiger doth in pieces
tear :
The melody of other men's delight
There are, alas! who can as "little
bear.
6UG
TRENCH.
THE DIAMOND.
1 ONLY polished am in mine own
dust —
Naiiglit else against my hardness
will prevail:
And thou, O man, in thine own
sufferings must
He polished: every meaner art will
fail.
FALLING STAIiS.
Angels are we, that, once from
heaven exiled,
Would climb its crystal battlements
again;
But have their keen-eyed watchers
not beguiled.
Hurled by their glittering lances
back amain.
HA HMOS AS.
Now the third and fatal conflict for the Persian throne was done,
And the Moslem's fiery valor had the crowning victory won.
Ilarmosan, the last and boldest the invader to defy,
Captive overborne by numbers, they were bringing forth to die.
Then exclaimed that noble captive: "Lo! I perish in my thirst;
(iive me but one drink of water, and let then arrive the worst!"
In his hanil he took the goblet, but awhile the drauglit forbore.
Seeming doubtfully the purpose of the foemen to explore.
Well might then have paused the bravest — for around him angry foes
With a hedge of naked v,eapons did that lonely man enclose.
"^ Ikit what fear'st thou ? " cried the caliph ; — "is it, friend, a secret blow ?
Fear it not! — our gallant Moslem no such treacherous dealing know.
" Tliou mayst quench thy thirst securely, for thou shalt not die before
Thou hast drunk that cup of water — this reprieve is thine — no more!"
C^uick the satrap dashed the goblet down to earth with ready hand,
And the liquid sank for ever, lost amid the burning sand.
" Thou hast said that mine my life is, till the water of that cup
I have drained; then bid thy servants that spilled water gather up!"
For a moment stood the caliph as by doubtful passions stirred —
Then exclaimed : " For ever sacred nmst remain a monarch's word.
" Bring another cup, and straightway to the noble Persian give:
Drink, I said before, and perish — now I bid thee drink and live!"
TROWBRIDGE.
mi
John Townsend Trowbridge.
THE NAME /A' THE HAHK.
The self of so long ago,
And the self I struggle to know, —
I sometimes think we are two, — or are w« shadows of one ?
To-day the shadow 1 am
Keturns in the sweet summer calm
To trace where the earlier shadow flitted awhile in the sun.
Once more in the dewy morn
I came through the whispering corn ;
Cool to my fevered cheek soft breezy kisses were l)lo\vn;
The ribboned and tasselled grass
Leaned over the flattering glass,
And the sunny waters trilled the same low musical tone.
To the gray old birch I came,
Where 1 whittled my school-boy name:
The nimble squirrel once more ran skippingly over the rail,
The blackbirds down among
The alders noisily sung.
And under the blackberry-brier whistled the serious quail.
I came, remembering well
How my little shadow fell,
As 1 painfully reached and wrote to leave to the futiue a sign :
There, stooping a little, I found
A half-healed, curious wound.
An ancient scar in the bark, but no initial of mine!
Then the wise old boughs overhead
Took counsel together, and said, —
And the buzz of their leafy lips like a murmur of prophecy passed,-
" He is busily carving a name
In the tough old wrinkles of fame;
But, cut he as deep as he may, the lines will close over at last!"
Sadly I pondered awhile.
Then I lifted my soul with a smile.
And 1 said " Not cheerful men, but anxious children are we.
Still hurting ourselves with the knife.
As we toil kt the letters of life,
Just marring a little the rind, never piercing the heart of the tree."
And now by the rivulet's brink
I leisurely saunter, and think
How idle this strife will appear when circling ages have run,
If then the real I am
Descend from the heavenly calm.
To trace where the shadow I seem once flitted awhile in the sim.
t)08
TROWBRIDGE.
THE RESTORED PICTURE.
In later years, veiling its iniblest face
In a most loatlisome place,
The cheap adornment of a house of
shame,
It hung, till, gnawed away
By tooth of slow decay,
It fell, and parted from its moulder-
ing frame.
The rotting canvas, faintly smiling
still.
From worldly puff and frill,
Its ghastly smile of coquetry and
pride,
Crumpling its faded charms
And yellow jewelled arms.
Mere rubbisli now, was rudely cast
aside.
The shadow of a Genius crossed the
gate:
He, slcilled to re-create
In old and ruined paintings their lost
soul
And beauty. — one who knew
Tlie Master's touch by true,
Swift instinct, as the needle Ivuows
the pole, —
Looked on it, and straightway his
searching eyes
Saw through its coarse disguise
Of vulgar paint and grime and var-
nish stain
The Art that slept beneath. —
A chrysalis in its sheath.
That waited to be waked to life
again.
Upon enduring canvas to renew
Each wondrous trait and hue, —
This is the miracle, his chosen task!
He bears it to his house.
And there from lips and brows
With loving touch removes their alien
mask.
For so on its perfection time had laid
An early mellowing shade;
Then hands unskilled," each seeking
to Impart
Fresh tints to form and face.
With some more modern grace,
Had buried quite the mighty Master's
Art.
First, razed from the divine original,
Brow, cheek, and lid, went all
That outer shape of worldliuess;
when, lo!
Beneath the varnished crust
Of long-embed.ded dust
A fairer face appears, emerging
slow, —
The features of a simple sliepherd-
ess!
Pure eyes, and golden tress.
And, lastly, crook in hand. But
deeper still
The Master's work lies hid;
And still through lip and lid
Works the Restorer with unsparing
skill.
Behold, at length, in tender light re-
vealed.
The soul so long concealed !
All heavenly faint at first, then softly
bright.
As smiles the young-eyed Dawn
AVhen darkness is withdrawn,
A shining angel breaks upon the
sightl
Restored, perfected, after the divine
Imperishable design,
Lo, now! that once desi^ised and out-
cast thing
Holds its true place among
The fairest pictiu'es hung
In the higli palace of our Lord the
King!
M/OiriXTER.
The speckled sky is dim with snow.
The light Hakes falter and fall
slow;
Athwart the hill-top, rapt and pale.
Silently drops a silvery veil;
And ail the valley is shut in
By flickering curtains gray and thin.
I watch the slow flakes as they fall
On bank and brier and broken wall;
Over the orchard, waste and brown.
All noiselessly they settle down,
TROWBRIDGE.
609
Tipping the apple-boughs, and each
Light quivering twig of pUuu and
peach.
On turf and curb and bower-roof
Tlie snow storm spreads its ivory
woof;
It paves with pearl tlie garden walk;
And lovingly round tattered stalk
And shivering stem its magic weaves
A mantle fair as lily-leaves.
The hooded beehive, small and low.
Stands like a maiden in the snow;
And the old door-slab is half hid
Under an alabaster lid.
All day it snows : the sheeted post
Gleams in the dimness like a ghost;
All day the blasted oak has stood
A muffled wizard of the wood ;
(rarlantl and airy cap adorn
The sumach and the wayside thorn.
And clustering spangles lodge and
shine
In the dark tresses of the pine.
The ragged bramble, dwarfed and old,
Shrinks like a beggar in the cold;
In surplice white the cedar stands,
And blesses him with priestly hands.
Still cheerily the chickadee
Singeth to me on fence and tree:
But in my inmost ear is heard
The nnisic of a holier bird;
And heavenly thoughts, as soft and
white
As snow-flakes, on my soul alight.
Clothing with love my lonely heart.
Healing with peace each bruised
part.
Till all my being seems to be
Transfigured by their purity.
MIDSUMMER.
Becalmed along the azure sky,
The argosies of cloudland lie,
Whose shores, with many a shining
rift,
Far off their jjearl-white peaks uplift.
Through all the long midsummer-
day
The meadow-sides are sweet with
bay.
I seek the coolest sheltered seat,
Just where the field and forest
meet, —
Where grow the pine-trees tall and
bland.
The ancient oaks austere and grand,
And fringy roots and pebbles fret
The ripples of the rivulet.
I watch the mowers, as they go
Through the tall grass, a white-
sleeved row.
With even stroke their scythes they
swing.
In tune their merry whetstones ring.
Behind the nimble youngsters run.
And toss the thick swaths in the sun.
The cattle graze, while, warm and
still.
Slopes the broad pasture, basks the
hill.
And bright, where summer breezes
break.
The green wheat crinkles like a lake.
The butterfly and bumble-bee
Come to the pleasant woods with me ;
Quickly before me runs the quail,
Iler chickens skulk behind the rail;
High up the lone wood-pigeon sits,
And the woodpecker pecks and flits.
Sweet woodland music sinks and
swells,
The brooklet rings its tinkling bells.
The swarming insects drone and
hum.
The partridge beats his throbbing
drum,
The squirrel leaps among the boughs,
And chatters in his leafy house.
The oriole flashes by ; and look !
Into the mirror of the brook,
Where the vain bluebird trims his
coat.
Two tiny feathers fall and float.
As silently, as tenderly.
The down of peace descends on me.
O, tills is peace! I have no need
Of friend to talk, of book to read:
610
TROWBRIDGE.
A dear Companion here abides ;
Close to my thrilling heart He hides ;
The holy silence is His Voice:
I lie and listen, and rejoice.
REAL ESTATE.
The pleasant gromids are greenly
turfed and graded ;
A sturdy porter waiteth at the
gate;
The graceful avenues, serenely
shaded.
And curving paths, are interlaced
and braiiled
In many a maze around my fair
estate.
Here bloom the early hyacinth, and
clover
And amaranth and myrtle wreathe
the ground ;
The pensive lily leans her pale cheek
over ;
And hither comes the bee, light-
hearted rover,
Wooing the sweet-breathed flowers
with soothing sound.
Entwining, in their manifold digres-
sions,
Lands of my neighbors, wind these
peaceful ways.
The masters, coming to their calm
possessions,
Followed in solemn state by long pro-
cessions,
Make quiet journeys these still
summer days.
This is my freehold! Elms and fringy
larches.
Maples and pines, and stately firs
of Norway,
Build round me tlieir green pyramids
and arches ;
Sweetly the robin sings, while slowly
marches
The stately pageant past my ver-
dant doorway.
Oh, sweetly sing the robin and the
sparrow !
But the pale tenant very silent
rides.
A low green roof receiveth him; — so
narrow
His hollow tenement, a schoolboy's
arrow
Might span the space betwixt its
grassy sides.
The flowers around him ring their
wind-swung chalices,
A great bell tolls the pageant's slow
advance.
The poor alike, and lords of parks
and palaces.
From all their busy schemes, their
fears and fallacies.
Find here their rest and sure inher-
itance.
No more hath Caesar or Sardanapa-
lus!
Of all our wide dominions, soon or
late.
Only a fathom's space can aught
avail us;
This is the heritage that shall not
fail us:
Here man at last comes to his Real
Estate.
" Secure to him and to his heirs for-
ever" !
Nor wealth nor want shall vex his
spirit more.
Treasures of hope and love and high
endeavor
Follow their blest proprietor; but
never
Could pomp or riches pass this lit-
tle door.
Flatterers attend him, but alone he
enters, —
Shakes off the dust of earth, no
more to roam.
His trial ended, sealed his soul's in-
dentures,
The wanderer, weai-y from his long
adventures.
Beholds the peace of his eternal
home.
TROWBRIDGE.
611
Lo, more than life, Man's great Estate
comprises !
Wliile for tlie eartlily corner of his
mansion
A little nook in shady Time suffices,
The rainbow-pillared heavenly roof
arises
Ethereal in limitless expansion!
THE OLD MAN OF THE MOUN-
TAIN.
All round the lake the wet woods
shake
From drooping boughs their show-
ers of pearl ;
From floating skiff to towering cliff
The rising vapors part and curl.
The west-wind stirs among the firs
High up the mountain side emerg-
ing:
The liglit illumes a thousand plumes
Through billowy banners round
them surging.
A glory smites the craggy heights :
And in a halo of the haze.
Flushed with faint gold, far up, behold
That mighty face, that stony gaze!
In the wild sky upborne so high
Above us perishable creatures,
Confronting Time witli those sub-
lime,
Impassive, adamantine, features.
Thou beaked and bald high front,
miscalled
The profile of a human face!
No kin art thou, O Titan brow.
To puny man's ephemeral race.
The groaning earth to thee gave
birth, —
Throes and convulsions of the
planet ;
Lonely uprose, in grand repose.
Those eighty feet of facial granite.
Here long, while vast, slow ages
passed.
Thine eyes (if eyes be thine) beheld
But solitudes of crags and woods.
Where eagles screamed and pan-
thers yelled.
Before the fires of our pale sires
In the first log-built cabin twinkled,
Or red men came for fish and game.
That scalp was scarred, that face
was wrinkled.
We may not know how long ago
That ancient countenance was
young;
Thy sovereign brow was seamed as
now
When Moses wrote and Homer
sung.
Empires and states it antedates,
And wars, and arts, and crime, and
glory ;
In that dim morn \^hen man was
born
Thy head with centuries was
hoary.
Thou lonely one ! nor frost, nor sun,
Nor tempest leaves on thee its
trace ;
The stormy years are but as tears
That pass from thy unchanging
face.
With unconcern as grand and stern.
Those features viewed, which now
survey us,
A green world rise from seas of ice.
And order come from mud and
chaos.
Canst thou not tell what then befell?
What forces moved, or fast or
slow ;
How grew the hills; what heats, what
chills,
What strange, dim life, so long ago?
High-visaged peak, wilt thou not
speak?
One word for all our learned wran-
gle!
What earthquakes shaped, what gla-
ciers scraped.
That nose, and gave the chin its
angle?
Our pygmy thought to thee is naught,
Our petty questionings are vain ;
In i^ts great trance thy countenance
Knows not compassion nor dis-
dain.
612
TROWBRIDGE.
With far-off hum we go and come,
The gay, the grave, the busy-idle;
And all things done, to thee are one,
Ahke the burial and the bridal.
Thy permanence, long ages hence,
Will mock the pride of mortals
still.
Keturning springs, with songs and
wings I fill ;
And fragrance, shall these valleys
The free winds blow, fall rain or
snow.
The mountains brim their crystal
breakers ;
Still come and go, still ebb and flow.
The summer tides of pleasure-seek-
ers.
The dawns shall gild the peaks where
build
The eagles, many a future pair;
The gray scud lag on wood and crag,
Dissolving in the purple air;
The sunlight gleam on lake and
stream.
Boughs wave, storms break, and
still at even
All glorious hues the world suffuse.
Heaven mantle earth, earth melt in
heaven !
Nations shall pass like summer's
grass,
And times unborn grow old and
change ;
New governments and great events
Shall rise, and science new and
strange ;
Yet will thy gaze confront the days
With its eternal calm and patience,
The evening red still light thy head.
Above tliee burn the constellations.
silent speech, that well can teach
The little worth of woi-ds or fame !
1 go my way, but thou wilt stay
While future millions pass the
same:
But what is this I seem to miss ?
Those features fall into confusion !
A further pace — where was that
face?
The veriest fugitive illusion !
Gray eidolon ! so quickly gone.
When eyes that make thee onward
move;
Whose vast pretence of permanence
A little progress can disprove!
Like some huge wraith of human
faith
That to the mind takes form and
measure ;
Grim monolith of creed or myth.
Outlined against the eternal azure !
O Titan, how dislimned art thou!
A withered cliff is all we see;
That giant nose, that grand repose,
Have in a moment ceased to be;
Or still depend on lines that blend,
On merging shapes, and sight, and
distance,
And in the mind alone can find
Imaginary brief existence !
STANZAS FROM ''SERVICE."
Well might red shame my cheek
consume !
service slighted!
Bride of Paradise, to whom
1 long was plighted !
Do I with burning liiis profess
To serve thee wliolly,
Yet labor less for blessedness
Than fools for folly ?
Tbe wary worldling spread his toils
Whilst I was sleepin?;
The wakeful miser locked his spoils,
Keen vigils keeping:
1 loosed the latches of my soul
To pleading Pleasure,
Who stayed one little hour, and stole
My heavenly treasure.
A friend for friend's sake will endure
Sharp provocations ;
And knaves are cunning to secure,
By cringing patience,
And smiles upon a smarting cheek.
Some dear advantage. —
Swathing their grievances in meek
Submission's bandage.
TROWBRIDOE.
613
Yet for thy sake I will not take
One drop of trial,
But raise rebellious hands to break
The bitter vial.
At hardship's surly-visaged churl
My spirit sallies;
And melts, O Peace! thy priceless
pearl
In passion's chalice.
Yet never quite, in darkest night,
Was I forsaken:
DowTi trickles still some starry rill
My heart to waken.
O Love Divine! could I resign
This changeful spirit
To walk thy ways, what wealth of
grace
Migiit I inherit !
If one poor flower of thanks to thee
Be truly given.
All night thou snowest down to me
Lilies of heaven !
One task of human love fulfilled
Thy glimpses tender,
My days of lonely labor gild,
With gleams of splendor!
MY COMRADE AXD I.
We two have grown up so divinely together,
Flower within flower from seed within seed,
The sagest philosopher cannot say whether
His being or mine was first called and decreed.
In the life before birth, by inscrutable ties.
We were linked each to each ; I am bound up in him ;
He sickens, I languish; without me, he dies;
I am life of his life, he is limb of my limb.
Twin babes from one cradle, I tottered about with him,
Chased the bright butterflies, singing, a boy with him;
Still as a man I am borne in and out with him.
Sup with him, sleep with him, suffer, enjoy with him.
Faithful companion, me long he has carried
Unseen in his bosom, a lamp to his feet;
More near than a bridegroom, to him I am married,
As light in the sunbeam is wedded to heat.
If my beam be withdrawn he is senseless and blind;
I am sight to his vision, I hear with his ears;
His the man^ellous brain, I the masterful mind;
I laugh with his laughter, and weep Avith his tears
So well that the ignorant deem us but one :
They see but one shape and they name us one name.
O pliant accomplice! what deeds we have done,
Thus banded together for glory or shame.
When evil waylays us, and i^assion surprises,
And we are too feeble to strive or to fly.
When hunger compels or when pleasure entices.
Which most is the sinner, my comrade or I ?
And when over perils and ]iains and temptations
I triumph, where still I should falter and faint.
But for him, iron-nerved for heroical patience.
Whose then is the virtue, and which is the saint ?
614
TUPPER.
Am I the one sinner ? of honors sole claimant
For actions which only we two can perform '?
Am I the true creatui'e, and thou but the raiment '?
Thou magical luantle, all vital and warm,
Wrapped about me, a screen from the rough winds of Time,
(^f texture so flexile to feature and gesture !
Can ever I part from thee ? Is there a clime
Where Life needeth not this terrestrial vesture '?
When comes the sad summons to sever the sweet
Subtle tie that unites us, and tremulous, fearful.
I feel thy loosed fetters depart from my feet;
\Vhen friends gather round us, pale-visaged and tearful,
Beweep and bewail thee, thou fair earthly prison!
And kiss thy cold doors, for thy inmate mistaken ;
Their eyes seeing not the freed captive, arisen
From thy trammels unclasped and thy shackles downshakeu;
Oh, then shall I linger, reluctant to break
The dear sensitive chains that about me have grown ?
And all this bright world, can I bear to forsake "
Its embosoming beauty and love, and alone
Journey on to I know not what regions untried ?
Exists there, beyond the dim cloud-rack of death.
Such life as enchants us ? O skies arched and wide!
delicate senses! O exquisite breath!
Ah, tenderly, tenderly over thee hovering,
1 shall look down on thee, empty and cloven.
Pale mould of my being! — thou visible covering
Wherefroni my invisible raiment is woven.
Though sad be the passage, nor i^ain shall appall me,
Nor parting, assured, wheresoever I range
The glad fields of existence that naught can befall me
That is not still beautiful, blessed and strange.
Martin Farquhar Tupper*
iFrom Self-Acqua in tan cr . ]
ILL-CHOSEN PURSUITS.
The blind at an easel, the palsied with a graver, the halt making for the goal,
The deaf ear tuning psaltery, the stammerer discoursing eloquence, —
What Avonder if all fail ? the shaft flieth wide of the mark.
Alike if itself be crooked, or the bow be strung awry;
And the mind which were excellent in one way, but foolishly toileth in
another,
What is it but aji ill-strung bow, and its aim a crooked arrow ?
By knowledge of self, thou provest thy powers; put not the racer to the
plough.
Nor goad the toilsome ox to wager his slowness with the fleet.
The extracts from this author are from Proverbial Philosophy.
IFrom Fame.}
THE DIGNITY AND PATIENCE OF GENIUS.
A GREAT mind is an altar on a hill; should the priest descend from his
altitude
To canvass ott'erings and worship from dwellers on the plain ?
Eather with majestic perseverance, will he minister in solitary grandeur,
Confident the time will come when pilgrims shall be flocking to the shrine.
For fame is the birthright of genius ; and he recketh not how long it be
delayed :
The heir need not hasten to his heritage, when he knoweth that his tenure
is eternal.
The careless poet of Avon, was he troubled for his fame ?
Or the deep-mouthed chronicler of Paradise, heeded he the suffrage of his
equals '?
Majonides took no thought, committing all his honors to the future,
And Flaccus, standing on his watch-tower, spied the praise of ages.
[From Truth in Tliinga Fahe.]
• SPIRITUAL FEELEHS.
The soul hath its feelers, cobwebs floating on the wind.
That catch events in their approach with sure and apt presentiment,
So that some halo of attraction heraldeth a coming friend.
Investing, in his likeness, the stranger that passed on before;
And whUe the word is in thy mouth, behold thy word fulfilled,
And he of whom we spake can answer for himself.
\_From Writing.}
LETTERS.
TiiEiR preciousness in absence is proved by the desire of their presence:
When the despairing lover waiteth day after day,
Looking for a word in reply, one word writ by that hand.
And cursing bitterly the morn ushered in by blank disappointment:
Or when tlie long-looked-for answer argueth a cooling friend.
And the mind is plied suspiciously with dark inexplicable doubts,
While thy wounded heart counteth its imaginary scars.
And thou art the innocent and injured, that friend the capricious and in
fault:
Or when the earnest petition, that craveth for thy needs
Unheeded, yea, unopened, tortureth with starving delay:
Or when the silence of a son, who would have written of his welfare,
IJacketh a father's bosom with sharp-cutting fears:
For a letter, timely writ, is a rivet to the chain of affection;
And a letter, imtimely delayed, is as rust to the solder.
The pen, flowing in love, or tUpped black in hate,
Or tipped with delicate courtesies, or harshly edged with censure.
Hath (luickened more good than the sun, more evil than the sword,
More joy than woman's smile, more woe than frowning fortune;
And shouldst thou ask ray judgment of that which hath most profit in the
world,
For answer take thou this. The prudent penning of a letter.
616
TUPPER.
[From Beauty. 1
THE CONQUEROR.
Thou mightier than Manoah's son, whence is thy great strength,
And wherein the secret of thy craft, O charmer charming wisely '? —
Ajax may ront a plialanx, but beauty sliall enslave him single-handed :
Pericles ruled Athens, yet is he the servant of Aspasia:
Light were the labor, and often-told the tale, to count the victories of
beauty, —
Learning sitteth at her feet, and Idleness laboreth to please her;
Folly hath flung aside his bells, and leaden Dulness gloweth ;
Prudence is rasli in her defence; Frugality filleth her witli riches;
Despair came to her for counsel; and Bereavement was glad when she
consoled ;
Justice putteth up his sword at the tear of supplicating beauty
And Mercy, with indulgent haste, hath pardoned beauty's sin.
For beauty is the substitute for all things, satisfying every absence,
The rich delirious cup, to make all else forgotten. ,
\_From Beauty.]
ME NT A L S U PRE MA CY.
There is a beauty of the reason: grandly independent of externals.
It looketh from the windows of the house, shining in the man triumphant.
I have seen the broad blank face of some misshapen dwarf
Lit on a sudden as with glory, the brilliant light of mind:
Who then imagined him deformed ? intelligence is blazing on his forehead.
There is empire in his eye, and sweetness on his lip, and his brown cheek
glittereth Avith beauty:
And 1 have known some Nireus of the camp, a varnished paragon of
chamberers,
Fine, elegant, and shapely, moulded as the masterpiece of Phidias, —
Such an one, with intellects abased, have I noted crouching to the dwarf,
Whilst his lovers scorn the fool whose beauty hath departed!
[From Beauty.]
THE SOURCE OF MAN'S RULING PASSION.
Vepjly the fancy may be false, yet hath it met me in my musings,
(As expounding the pleasantness of pleasure, but no Avays extenuating
license,)
That even tliose yearnings after beauty, in wayward wanton youth.
When guileless of ulterior end, it craveth but to look upon the lovely,
Seem like struggles of the soul, dimly remembering pre-existence.
And feeling in its blindness for a long-lost god to satisfy its longing;
God, the undiluted good, is root and stock of beauty.
And every child of reason drew his essence from that stem.
Therefore, it is of intuition, an innate hankering for home,
TUPPER.
617
A sweet returning to the well, from which our spirit flowed,
That we, unconscious of a cause, should bask these darkened souls
In some poor relics of the light that blazed in primal beauty.
Only, being burdened with the body, spiritual appetite is warped,
And sensual man, with taste corrupted, driuketh of .pollutions:
Impulse is left, but indiscriminate; his hunger feasteth upon carrion;
His natural love of beauty doteth over beauty in decay.
He still thirsteth for the beautiful ; but his delicate ideal hath grown gross.
And the very sense of thirst hath been fevered from affection into passion.'
iFrom Indirect Influences.]
ARGUMENT.
The weakness of accident is strong, where the strength of design is weak,
And a casual analogy convinceth, when a mind beareth not argument.
Will not a man listen ? be silent; and prove thy maxim by example:
Never fear, thou losest not thy hold, though thy mouth doth not render a
reason.
Contend not in wisdom with a fool, for thy sense maketh much of his
conceit,
And some errors never would have thriven, had it not been for learned
refutation ;
Yea, much evil hath been caused by an honest wrestler for truth.
And much of unconscious good, by the man that hated wisdom:
For the intellect judgeth closely, and if thou overstep thy argument,
Or seem not consistent with thyself, or fail in thy direct purpose.
The mind that went along with thee, shall stop and return without thee,
And thou shall have raised a foe, where thou mightest have won a friend.
[From Indirect Influences.']
THE POWER OF SUGGESTION.
HiifTS, shrewdly strown, mightily disturb the spirit.
Where a barefaced accusation would be too ridiculous for calumny :
The sly suggestion touches nerves, and nerves contract the fronds.
And the sensitive mimosa of affection trembleth to its root;
And friendships, the growth of half a century, those oaks that laugh at
storms,
Have been cankered in a night by a worm, even as the prophet's gourd.
Hast thou loved, and not known jealousy ? for a sidelong look
Can please or pain thy heart more than the nudtitude of proofs :
Hast thou hated, and not learned that thy silcMit scorn
Doth deeper aggravate thy foe than loud-cursing malice ? —
Thinkest thou the thousand eyes that shine with rapture on a ruin,
Would have looked with half their wonder on the perfect pile ?
And wherefore not — but that light hints, suggesting unseen beauties
Fill the complacent gazer with self-grown conceits ?
618
TUPPER.
And so, tlie rapid sketch winneth more praise to the painter.
Than tlie consummate work elaborated on his easel :
And so. the Helvetic lion caverned in the living rock
Hath more of majesty and force, than if upon a marble pedestal.
. . . . What hath charmed thine ear in music ?
Is it the labored theme, the curious fugue or cento. —
Nor rather the sparkles of intelligence flashing from some strange note
Or the soft melody of sounds far sweeter for simplicity ?
. . . . What hath filled thy mind in reading?
Is it the volume of detail, where all is orderly set down,
And they that read may run. nor need to stop and think;
The book carefully accurate, that counteth thee no better than a fool,
Gorging the passive mind with annotated notes; —
iS'or rather the half-suggested thoughts, the riddles thou mayest solve;
The light analogy, or deep allusion, trusted to thy learning.
The confidence implied in thy skill to unravel meaning mysteries ?
For ideas are ofttimes shy of the close furniture of words.
And thought, wherein only is power, may be best conveyed by a suggestion.
The flash that lighteth up a valley, ainid the dark midnight of a storm,
Coineth the mind with that scene sharper than fifty summers.
[From Names.'\
ILL-CHRISTENED.
Who would call the tench a whale, or style a torch, Orion ?
Yet many a silly jjarent hath dealt likewise with his nursling.
Give thy child a fit distinguishment, making him sole tenant of a name.
For it were sore hindrance to hold It in common with a hundred;
In the Uabel of confused identities fame is little feasible,
The felon shall detract from the philanthropist, and the sage share honors
with the simple:
Still, in thy title of distinguishment, fall not into arrogant assumption.
Steering from caprice and affectations ; and for all thou doest have a reason.
He that is ambitious for his son. should give him untried names.
For those tliat have served other men. haply may injure by their evils;
Or otherwise may hinder by their glories; therefore set him by himself.
To win for his individual name some clear specific praise.
There were nine Homers, all goodly sons of song; but where is any record
of the eight ?
One grew to fame, an Aaron's rod. and swallowed up his brethren.
Who knoweth ? more distinctly titled, those dead eight had lived;
Art thou named of a family, the same in successive generations ?
It is open to thee still to earn for epithets, such an one. the good or great.
Art thou named foolishly ? show that thou art wiser than thy fathers.
Live to shame their vanity or sin by dutiful devotion to thy sphere.
Art thou named discreetly ? it is well, the course is free;
No competitor shall claim thy colors, neither fix his faults upon thee:
Hasten to the goal of fame between the posts of duty.
And win a blessing from the world, that men may love thy name ;
TUPPER.
619
[From Indirect Influences.']
THE FORCE OF TRIFLES.
A SENTENCE hath formed a character, and a character subdued a kingdom ;
A picture liatli ruined souls, or raised them to commerce with the sivies.
Planets govern not the soul, nor guide the destinies of man.
But trifles, lighter than straws, are levers in the building up of character.
[From y< gleet.]
TO MURMURERS.
Yet once more, griever at Neglect, hear me to thy comfort, or rebuke ;
For, after all thy just complaint, the world is full of love.
For human benevolence is large, though many matters dwarf it,
Prudence, ignorance, imposture, and the straitenings of circumstance and
time.
And if to the body, so to the mind, the mass of men are generous:
Their estimate who know us best, is seldom seen to err:
Be sure the fault is thine, as pride, or shallowness, or vanity,
If all around thee, good and bad, neglect thy seeming merit.
Therefore examine thy state, O self-accoimted martyr of Neglect,
It may be, thy merit is a cubit, and thy measure thereof a furlong:
But grant it greater than thy thoughts, and grant that men thy fellows
For pleasure," business, or interest, misuse, forget, neglect thee, —
Still be thou conqueror in tliis, the consciousness of higli deservings;
Let it suffice tliee to be worthy ; faint not thou for praise ;
For that thou art, be grateful; go humbly even In thy confidence;
And set thy foot on the neck of an enemy so harmless as Neglect.
[From Memory.]
HINTS OF PRE-EXISTEXCE.
Weke I at Petra, could I not declare. My soul hath been here before me ?
Am I strange to the columned halls, the calm dead grandeur of Palmyra ?
Know I not thy mount, O Carmel ! Have I not voyaged on the Danube
Nor seen the glare of Arctic snows, — nor the black tents of the Tartar ?
Is it then a dream, that I remember the faces of them of old ?
Be ye my judges, imaginative minds, full-fledged to soar into tlie sun,
Whose grosser natural thoughts the chemistry of wisdom hath sublimed,
Have ye not confessed to a feeling, a consciousness, strange and vague,
That ye have gone this way before, and walk again your daily life,
Tracking an old routine, and on some foreign strand,
Where bodily ye have never stood, finding your own footsteps ?
Hath not at times some recent friend looked out an old familiar.
Some newest circumstance or place teemed as with ancient memories ?
A startling sudden flash lighteth up all for an instant.
And then it is quenched, as in darkness, and leaveth the cold spirit
tremblinj:
620
TUPPER.
[From Neglect.']
LATE VALUATION.
Good men are the health of the world, valued only when it perishetli;
Like water, light, and air, all precious in their absence.
AVho hath considered the blessing of his breath, till the poison of an asthma
struclv him ?
Who hath regarded the just pulses of his heart, till spasm or paralysis
have stopped them ?
Even thus, an unobserved routine of daily grace and wisdom,
When no more here, had worship of a world, whose penitence atoned for
its neglect.
[ From Mystery.']
FOREKNOWLEDGE UNDESIRABLE.
For mystery is man's life; we wake to the whisperings of novelty:
And what tliough we lie down disappointed ? we sleep, to wake in hope.
The letter, or the news, the chances and the changes, matters that may
happen.
Sweeten or embitter daily life with the honey-gall of mystery.
For we walk blindfold, — and a minute may be much, — a step may reach
the precipice ;
What earthly loss, what heavenly gain, may not this day produce ?
Levelled of Alps and Andes, without its valleys and ravines,
How dull the face of earth, imfeatured of both beauty and sublimity:
And so, shorn of mystery, beggared in its hopes and fears.
How flat the prospect of existence, mapped by intuitive foreknowledge ?
[From To-Day.]
LIFE.
A man's life is a tower, with a staircase of many steps.
That, as he toileth upward, crumble successively behind him :
No going back, the past is an abyss; no stopping, for the present perisheth;
But ever hasting on, precarious on the foothold of To-day.
[From To-Moi-roir.]
THE WORD OF BANE AND BLESSING.
Oftkn, the painful present is comforted by flattering the future.
And kind To-morrow beareth half the burdens of To-day.
To-morrow, whispereth weakness ; and To-morrow findeth him the weaker.
To-morrow, promiseth conscience; and behold, no to-day for a fulfilment.
O name of hapj^y omen unto youth, O bitter word of terror to the dotard,
Goal of folly's lazy wish, and sorrow's ever-coming friend.
Fraud's loophole, — caution's hint, — and trap to catch the honest, —
Thou wealth to many poor, disgrace to many noble.
Thou hope and fear, thou weal and woe, thou remedy, thou ruin.
How thickly swarms of thought are clustering round To-morrow.
\^From To-Morrou\]
PROCllAS TINA TION.
Lo, it is tlie even of To-day, —a clay so lately a To-morrow;
Where are those high resolves, those hopes of yesternight ?
O faint heart, still shall thy whisper be. To-morrow,
And mnst the growing avalanche of sin roll down that easy slope ?
Alas, it is ponderous, and moving on in might, that a Sisyphus may not
stop it ;
But haste thee with the lever of a prayer, and stem its strength To-day.
Henry Vaughan.
THE SEED GROWING SECRETLY.
Deapv, secret greenness ! nurst below!
Tempests and winds and winter-
nights
Vex not, tliat but One sees thee grow.
That One made all these lesser
lights.
If those bright joys He singly sheds
On thee, were all met in one crown.
Both sun and stars would hide their
heads ;
And moons, though full, would get
them down.
Let glory be their bait whose minds
Are all too high for a low cell:
Though hawks can prey through
storms and winds.
The poor bee in her hive must
dwell.
Glory, the crowd's cheap tinsel, still
To what most takes them is a
drudge ;
And they too oft take good for ill.
And thriving vice for virtue judge.
What needs a conscience calm and
bright
Within itself an outward test ?
Who breaks his glass to take more
light,
Makes way for storms into his rest.
Then bless thy secret growth, nor
catch
At noise, but thrive unseen and
dumb ;
Keep clean, bear fruit, earn life, and
watch.
Till the white-winged reapers come !
THEY ARE ALL GONE.
They are all gone into the world of
light.
And i alone sit lingering here !
Their very memory is fair and bright,
And my sad thoughts doth clear.
It glows and glitters in my cloudy
breast,
Like stars upon some gloomy grove,
Or those faint beams in which this
hill is drest
After the sun's remove.
I see them walking in an air of glory,
Whose light doth trample on my
days ;
My days, winch are at best but dull
and hoary.
Mere glimmering and decays.
O holy hope ! and high humility !
High as the heavens above !
These are your walks, and you have
shewed them me
To kindle my cold love.
Dear, beauteous death ; the jewel of
the just!
Shining nowliere but in the dark ;
What mysteries do lie beyond thy
dust,
Could man outlook that mark !
He that hath found some fledged
bird's nest may know
At first sight if tbe bird be flown ;
But wliat fair dell or grove he sings
in now,
That is to him unknown.
And yet, as angels in some brighter
dreams,
Call to the soul when man doth
sleep,
So some strange thoughts transcend
our wonted themes.
And into glory peep.
FROM '■'CHILDHOOD."
Deak, harmless age! the short, swift
span.
Where weeping virtue parts with
man ;
Where love without kist dwells, and
bends
AVhat way we please without self-
ends.
An age of mysteries ! which he
Must live twice that would God's face
see;
Which angels guard, and with it play.
Angels ! which foul men drive away.
PEACE.
My soul, there is a country
Afar beyond the stars.
Where stands a winged sentry
All skilful in the wars.
There, above noise and danger.
Sweet Peace sits, crowned
smiles,
And one born in a manger
Commands the beauteous files
with
He is thy gracious friend,
And (O my soul, awake)
Cid in pure love descend.
To die here for thy sake.
If thou canst get but thither,
There grows the flower of peace,
The rose that cannot wither.
The fortress, and thy ease.
Leave, then, thy foolish ranges;
For none can thee secure
But One, who never changes,
Thy God, thy Life, thy Cure.
THE PUIiSVir.
Lord ! what a busy, restless thing,
Hast thou made man !
Each day and hour lie is on wing.
Rests not a span.
Then having lost the sun and light,
By clouds surprised.
He keeps a commerce in the night
With air disguised.
Hadst thou given to this active dust
A state untired.
The lost son had not left the husk,
Nor home desird.
That was thy secret, and it is
Thy mercy too ;
For when all fails to bring to bliss.
Then this must do.
Ah, Lord! and what a purchase will
that be,
To take us sick, that sound would not
take thee !
FROM "ST. MAlir MAGDALEN."
Cheap, mighty art! her art of love,
Who loved much, and much more
could move ;
Her art ! whose memory must last
Till truth tlu-ougli all" the Avorld be
jjast ;
Till his abused, despised flame
Return to heaven from whence it
came,
And send a fire down, that shall
bring
Destruction on his ruddy wing.
Her art! whose pensive, weejjing
eyes
Were ouce sin's loose and tempting
spies ;
But now are fixed stars, Avliose light
Helps such dark stragglers to their
sight.
Self-boasting Pharisee ! how blind
A judge wert thou, anil how unkind I
It was impossible, that thou,
Who wert all false, should' st true
grief know.
Is't just to jvidge her faithful tears
By that foul rlieum thy false eye
wears ?
" This woman,"' say'st thou, " is a
sinner!"
And sate there none such at thy din-
ner ■?
Go, leper, go ! wash till thy flesh
Comes like a child's, spotless and
fresh ;
He is still leprous that still paints:
Who saint themselves, they are no
saints.
FROM THE " CHRISTIAX POLITICIAN.-
Come, then, rare politicians of the
time.
Brains of some standing, elders in our
clime,
See here the method. A wise, solid
state
Is quick in acting, friendly in debate.
Joint in advice, in resolutions just.
Mild in success, true to the common
trust.
It cements ruptures, and by gentle
hand
Allays the heat and burnings of a
land. [tract
Eeligion guides it; and in all the
Designs so twist, that Heaven con-
firms the act.
If from these lists you Avander, as
you steer,
Look back, and catechize your actions
here.
These are the marks to which true
statesmen tend,
And greatness here with goodness
hath one end.
PROVIDENCE.
Sacred and secret hand !
By whose assisting, swift command
The angel shewed that holy well.
Which freed poor Ilagar from her
fears,
And turn'd to smiles the begging
tears
Of young, distressed Ishmad.
How, in a mystic cloud
AYhich doth thy strange, sure mercies
shroud,
Dost thou convey man food and
money.
Unseen by him till they arrive
Just at his mouth, that thankless
hive.
Which kills thy bees, and eats thy
honey !
If I thy servant be.
Whose service makes even captives
free,
A fish shall all my tribute pay.
The swift-winged raven shall bring
me meat.
And 1 like flowers shall still go
neat.
As if I knew no month but May.
I will not fear what man,
With all his idiots and power, can.
Bags that wax old may plundered be;
But none can sequester or let
A state that with the siui doth set.
And comes next morning fresh as he.
Poor birds this doctrine sing.
And herbs which on dry hills do
spring.
Or in the howling wilderness
Do know thy dewy morning hours.
And watch all night for mists or
showers.
Then drink and praise thy bounteous-
ness.
May he for ever die
Who trusts not thee ! but wretchedly
Hunts gold and wealth, and will not
lend
Thy service nor his soul one day!
May his crown, like his hopes be
clay;
And, what he saves, may his foes
spend !
If all my portion here,
The measure given by thee each year,
Were by my causeless enemies
Usurped, it never should me grieve
Who know how well thou canst
relieve
Whose hands are open as thine eyes.
Great King of love and truth !
Who would' St not hate my froward
youth.
And wilt not leave me when grown
old;
Gladly Mill I, like Pontic sheep,
Unto my wormwood diet keep,
Since thou hast made thy arm my
fold.
SUNDAYS.
Bright shadows of true rest! some
shoots of bliss;
Heaven once a week ;
The next world's gladness prepossest
in this ;
A day to seek;
Eternity in time; the steps by which
We climb above all ages; lamps that
light
Man through his heap of dark days ;
and the rich
And full redemption of the whole
week's flight!
The pulleys unto headlong man ;
time's bower;
The narrow way;
Transplanted Paradise; God's walk-
ing-hour;
The cool o'th' day!
The creature's jubilee; God's parle
with dust;
Heaven here; man on those hills of
mirth and flowers;
Angels descending; the returns of
trust ;
A gleam of glory after six-days-
showers !
The church's love-feasts; time's pre-
rogative.
And interest
Deducted from the whole ; the combs
and hive,
And home of rest ;
The milky way chalked out with
suns ; a clue.
That guides through erring hours;
and in full story
A taste of heaven on earth; the
pledge and cue
Of a full feast ; and the out-courts of
glory.
THE SHOWER.
Waters above ! eternal springs !
The dew that silvers the Dove's
wings !
O welcome, welcome, to the sad!
Give dry dust drink, drink that
makes glad.
Many fair evenings, many flowers
Sweetened with rich and gentle show-
ers.
Have I enjoyed ; and down have run
Many a line and shining suii;
But never, till this happy hour.
Was blest with sucli an evening
shower !
FROM ''RULES AND LESSONS."
When first thy eyes imveil, give thy
soul leave
To do the like ; our bodies but forerun
The spirit's duty. True hearts spread
and heave
Unto their God, as flowers do to the
sun.
Give him thy first thoughts then;
so shalt thou keep
Him company all day, and in him
sleep.
Yet never sleep the sun up. Prayer
should
Dawn with the day. There are set,
awful hours
'Twixt heaven and us. The manna
was not good
VAUGHAN.
6-25
After sun-rising ; far-day sullies
flowers.
Rise to prevent the sun ; sleep doth
sins glut,
And lieaven's gate opens when this
world's is shut.
Serve God hefore the Avorld ; let him
not go.
Until thou hast a blessing; then re-
sign
The whole unto him; and remember
who
Prevail' d by wrestling ere the sun
did shine.
Pour oil upon the stones; weep for
thy sin ;
Then journey on, and have an eye
to heaven.
When the world's up, and every
swarm abroad,
Keep thou thy temper; mix not with
each clay;
Dispatch necessities ; life hath a load
Which must be carried on, and safely
may,
Yet keep those cares Mithout thee,
let the heart
Be God's alone, and choose the
better part.
To God, thy country, and thy friend
be true ;
If priest and people change, keep
thou thy ground.
Who sells religion is a Judas Jew;
\nd, oaths once broke, the soul can-
not be somid.
The perjurer's a devil let loose:
what can
Tie up his hands, that dares mock
God and man ?
!Seek not the same steps with the
crowd; stick thou
To thy sure trot; a constant, humlile
mind
Is both his own joy, and his Maker's
too;
liCt folly dust it on, or lag behind.
A sweet self-privacy in a right soul
Outnms the earth, and lines the
utmost pole.
To all that seek thee bear an open
heart ;
Make not thy breast a lal)yrinth or
traj) ;
If trials come, this will make good
thy part.
For honesty is safe, come what can
hap ;
It is the good man's feast, the
prince of flowers,
Which thrives in storms, and smells
best after showers.
Spend not an hour so as to ^^"eep an-
other.
For tears are not fliine own ; if thou
giv'st words.
Dash not with them thy friend, nor
heaven ; oh. smother
A viperous thought; some syllables
are swords.
Unbitted tongues are in their pres-
ence double ;
'They shame their owners, and their
liearers trouble.
When night comes, list thy deeds;
make plain the M-ay
'Twixt heaven and thee; block it not
with delays ;
But perfect all before thou sleep" st;
then say,
" There's one sun more strung on my
bead of days."
What's good score up for joy; the
bad well scann'd
"Wash off with tears, and get thy
Master's hand.
Thy accounts tluis made, spend in the
grave one hour
Before thy time; be not a stranger
there,
Where thou may'st sleep Mhole ages;
life's poor flower
Lasts not a night sometimes. Bad
spirits fear
This conversation; but the good
man lies
P^ntombed many days before he
dies.
626
VAUGHAN.
Being laid, and dressed for sleep, close
not thy eyes
Up with thy curtains; give thy soul
the wing
In some good thoughts ; so when thy
day shall rise,
And thou unrakest thy tire, those
sparks will bring
New flames; besides where these
lodge, vain heats mourn
And die; that bush, where God is,
shall not burn.
TO HIS BOOKS.
Bright books! the perspectives to
our weak sights,
The clear projections of discerning
lights,
Burning and shining thoughts, man's
posthume day,
The track of fled souls, and their
milky way, voice
The dead alive and busy, the still
Of enlarged spirits, kind Heaven's
white decoys!
Who lives with you lives like those
knowing flowers.
Which in commerce with light spend
all their houi's ;
Which shut to clouds, and shadow's
nicely shun,
But with glad haste unveil to kiss
the sun. (night.
Beneath you all is dark, and a dead
Which whoso lives in, wants both
health and sight.
By sucking you, the wise, like bees,
do grow
Healing and rich, though this they
do most slow.
Because most choicely ; for as great a
store
Have we of books as bees of herbs,
or more :
And the great task to try, then know,
the good.
To discern weeds, and judge of
wholesome food.
Is a rare scant perfonnance. For
man dies
Oft ere 'tis done, while the bee feeds
and flies.
But you were all choice flowers; all
set and dressed
By old sage florists, who well knew
the best ;
And I amidst you all am turned a
weed,
Not wanting knowledge, but for want
of heed.
Then thank thyself, Avild fool, that
would' st not be
Content to know — what was too
much for thee !
LIKE AS A IS' U USE.
Even as a nurse, whose child's im-
patient pace
Can hardly lead his feet from place
to place.
Leaves her fond kissing, sets him
down to go,
Nor does uphold him for a step or
two ;
But when she finds that he begins to
fall,
She holds him up and kisses him
withal ;
So God from man sometimes with-
draws his hand
AAvhile, to teach his infant faith to
stand;
But when He sees his feeble strength
begin
To fail, He gently takes him up
again.
VERY.
G21
Jones Very.
NA TUBE.
The bubbling brook doth leap when
I come by.
Because niy feet find measui'e with
its call ;
The birds know when the friend they
love is nigh,
For I am known to them, both great
and small.
The flower that on the lonely hill-
side grows
Expects me there when spring its
bloom has given;
And many a tree and bush my wan-
derings knows,
And e'en the clouds and silent stars
of heaven;
For he who witli his Maker walks
aright.
Shall be tlieir lord as Adam was be-
fore ;
His ear shall catch each sound with
new delight.
Each object wear the dress that then
it wore ;
And he, as when erect in soul he
stood,
Hear from his Father" s lips that all
is ijood.
THE WORLD.
'Tis all a great show.
The world that we're in —
None can tell when 'twas finished,
None saw it begin;
Men wander and gaze through
Its courts and its halls.
Like children whose love is
The picture-himg walls.
There are flowers in the meadow.
There are clouds in the sky —
Songs pour from the woodland,
The waters glide by:
Too many, too many
For eye or for ear.
The sights that we see.
And the sounds that we hear.
A weight as of slumber
Comes down on the mind;
So swift is life's train
To its objects we're blind;
I myself am but one
In the fleet-gliding show —
Like others I walk.
But know not whei'e I go.
One saint to another
I heard say " How long ? "
I listened, but nought more
I heard of his song;
The shadoM'S are walking
Through city and plain, —
How long shall the night
And its shadow remain ?
How long ere shall shine.
In this glimmer of things,
The light of which prophet
In prophecy sings ?
And the gates of that city
Be open, whose sim
No more to the Avest
Its circuit shall run !
HOME AND HEAVEN.
With the same letter heaven and
home begin.
And the words dwell together in the
mind;
For they who would a home in heav-
en win,
Must first a heaven in home begin to
find.
Be happy here, yet with a humble
soul
That looks for perfect happiness in
heaven ;
For what thou hast is earnest of the
whole
Which to the faithful shall at last
be given.
As once the patriarch, in a vision
blessed,
Saw the swift angels hastening to
and fro,
And the lone spot whereon he lay to
rest
Became to him the gate of heaven
below ;
So may to thee, when life itself is
done.
Thy home on earth and heaven above
be one.
Edmund Waller.
OLD AGE AND DEATH.
The seas are quiet when the winds
give o'er;
So calm are we when passions are no
more. [to boast
For then we know how vain it was
Of fleeting things, too certain to be
lost.
Clouds of affection from our younger
eyes
Conceal that emptiness which age
descries.
The soul's dark cottage, battered and
decayed.
Lets in new light through chinks
that time has made.
Stronger by weakness, wiser men be-
come, [home.
As they draw near to their eternal
Leaving the old, both worlds at once
tliey view.
That stand upon the threshold of the
new.
THE ROSE.
Go, lovely rose!
Tell her that wastes her time and me.
That now she knows,
When I resemble her to thee,
How sweet and fair she seems to be.
Tell her that's young.
And shuns to have her graces spied,
That hadst thovi sprung
In deserts where no men abide.
Thou must have vmcommended died.
Small is the worth
Of beauty from the light retired ;
Bid her come fortli —
Suffer herself to be desired.
And not blush so to be admired.
Then die, that she
The common fate of all things rare
May read in thee —
How small a part of time they share
That are so wondrous sweet and fair.
ON A GIRDLE.
That which her slender waist confined
Shall now my joyful temples bind :
No monarch but would give his crown,
His arms might do what tliis has done.
It was my heaven's extremest sphere,
The pale which held that lovely dear,
My joy, my grief, my hope, my love,
Did all within this circle move.
A narrow compass, and yet there
Dwelt all that's good and all that's fair;
Give me but what tliis riband bound.
Take all the rest the sim goes round.
WEBSTER.
629
Augusta Webster.
FROM ''A PREACHER.''
I KNOW not bow it is;
I take the faith in earnest, 1 believe,
Even at happy times I think I love,
1 try to pattern me upon the type
My Master left us, am no hypocrite
Playing my soul against good men's
applause.
Nor monger of the Gospel for a cure.
But serve a Master whom I chose
because
It seemed to me I loved Him, whom
till now
My longing is to love; and yet I feel
A falseness somewhere clogging me.
I seem
Divided from myself; I can speak
words
Of burning faith and fire myself with
them ;
I can, while upturned faces gaze on
me
As if 1 were their Gospel manifest,
Break into unplann,ed turns as natu-
ral
As the blind man's cry for healing,
pass beyond
My bounded manhood in the earnest-
ness
Of a messenger from God. And then
I come
And in my study's quiet find again
The callous actor who, because long
since
He had some feelings in him like the
talk
The book puts in his mouth, still
warms his pit
And even, in his lucky moods, him-
self,
AVith tlie passion of his part, but
lays aside
His heroism with his satin suit
And thinks " the part is good and
well conceived
And very natural — no flaw to find "
And then forgets it.
Yes, I preach to others
And am — I know not what — a cast-
away ?
No, but a man who feels his heart
asleep.
As he might feel his hand or foot.
To-night now I might triumph. Not
a breath
But shivered when I pictured the
dead soul
Awakening when the body dies, to
know
Itself has lived too late; and drew in
long
With yearning when I showed how
perfect love
Might make Earth's self be but an
earlier Heaven.
And I may say and not be over-bold.
Judging from former fruits, "Some
one to-night
Has come more near to God, some
one has felt
What it may mean to love Him,
some one learned
A new great horror against death
and sin.
Some one at least — it may be
many."
And yet, I know not why it is^ this
knack
Of sermon-making seems to carry
me
x4.thwart the truth at times before 1
know —
In little things at least; thank God
the greater
Have not yet grown, by the familiar
vise.
Such puppets of a phrase as to slip
by
Without clear recognition. Take to-
night —
I preached a careful sermon, gravely
planned.
630
WEBSTER.
All of it written. Not a line was
meant
To fit the mood of any differing
From my own judgment: not the
less I find —
(I thought of it coming home while
my good Jane
Talked of tlie Shetland pony I must
get
For the boys to learn to ride:) yes,
here it is,
And liere again on this page — l)lame
by rote,
Where by my private judgment I
blame not.
" We think our own thoughts on this
day," I said,
"Harmless it may be, kindly even,
still
Not Heaven's thoughts — not Sunday
thoughts I'll say."
Well now, do I, now that I think of
it,
Advise a separation of our thoughts
By Sundays and by week-days. Heav-
en's and ours ?
By no means, for I think the bar is
bad.
ril teach my children "Keep all
thinkings pure.
And think them when you like, if
but the time
Is free to any thinking. Think of
God
So often that in anything you do
It cannot seem you have forgotten
Him,
Just as you would not have forgotten
us.
Your mother and myself, although
your thoughts
Were not distinctly on us, while you
played ;
And, if you do this, in the Sunday's
rest
You will most naturally think of
Him."
Then here again " the pleasures of
the world
That tempt the younger members of
my flock."
Now I think really that they've not
enough
Of these same pleasures. Gray and
joyless lives
A many of them have, whom I would
see
Sharing the natural gayeties of youth.
I wish they'd more temptations of
the kind.
Now Donne and Allan preach such
things as these
Meaning tliem and believing. As for
me,
What did I mean 'i* Neither to feign
nor teach
A Pharisaic service. 'Twas just this.
That there are lessons and rebukes
long made
So much a thing of com'se that, un-
observing.
One sets them down as one puts dots
to i's,
Crosses to i's.
[From A Painter.]
THE AirrrsT's dread of blind-
ness.
How one can live on beauty and be
rich
Having only that ! — a thing not hard
to find.
For all the world is beauty. We
know that.
We painters, we whom God shows
how to see.
We have beauty ours, we take it
where we go.
Ay, my wise critics, rob me of niy
broad.
You can do that, but of my birth-
right, no.
Imprison me away from skies and
seas.
And the open sight of earth and her
rich life,
And the lesson of a face or golden
hair:
I'll find it for you on a whitewashed
wall.
Where the slow shadows only change
so much
As shows the street has different
darknesses
At noontime and at twiliglit.
WEBSTER.
631
Only that
Could make me poor of beauty which
I dread
Sometimes, I know not why, save
that it is
The one thing which I could
bear, not bear
Even with Kuth by me, even
Ruth's sake —
If this perpetual plodding with
brush
Should blind my fretted eyes!
not
for
the
ON THE LAKE.
A SUMMEK mist on the mountain
heights,
A golden haze in the sky,
A glow on the shore of sleeping
lights,
And shadows lie heavily.
P'ar in the valley the tOATO lies still,
Dreaming asleep in the glare.
Dreamily near purs the drowsy rill.
Dreams are afloat in the air.
Dreaming above us the languid sky,
Dreaming the slumbering lake,
And we who rest floating listlessly.
Say, love, do we dream or wake '?
THE GIFT.
HAPPY glow, O sun-bathed tree,
O golden-lighted river,
A love-gift has been given me,
And which of you is giver '?
1 came upon you something sad,
Musing a mournful measure.
Now all my heart in me is glad
With a quick sense of pleasure.
I came upon you with a heart
Half-sick of life's vexed story.
And now it grows of you a part,
Steeped in your golden glory.
A smile into my heart has crept
And laughs through all my beinj
New joy into my life has leapt,
A joy of only seeing !
O happy glow, O siui-bathed tree,
O golden-lighted river,
A love-gift has been given me,
And which of you is giver ?
TWO MAIDENS.
Two maidens listening to the sea —
The younger said " The waves are
glad,
The waves are singing as they break."
The elder spake :
"Sister, their murmur sounds to me
So very sad."
Two maidens looking at a grave —
One smiled, "A place of happy sleep.
It would be happy if I slept."
The younger wept :
"Oh, save me from the rest you crave.
So lone, so deep."
Two maidens gazing into life —
The younger said, " It is so fair,
So warm with light and love and
pride." ,
The elder sighed :
" It seems to me so vexed with strife,
So cold and bare."
Two maidens face to face with death :
The elder said, " With quiet bliss
Upon his breast I lay my head."
The younger said :
" His kiss has frozen all my breath.
Must I be his?"
632
WESLEY.
Charles Wesley.
STANZAS FROM " THE TRUE USE
OF MUSIC."
Listed into the cause of sin,
Why should a good be evil '?
Music, alas ! too long has been
Pressed to obey the devil —
Drunken, or lewd, or light, the lay
Flowed to the soul's undoing —
Widened, and strewed with flowers,
the way
Down to eternal ruin.
Who on the part of God will rise,
Innocent sound recover —
Fly on the prey, and take the prize,
Plunder the carnal lover —
Strip him of every moving strain.
Every melting measure —
Music in virtue's cause retain,
Rescue the holy pleasure ?
Come, let us try if Jesus' love
Will not as well inspire us;
Tliis is the theme of those above —
This upon earth shall fire us.
Say, if your hearts are tuned to sing
is there a subject greater ?
Harmony all its strains may bring;
Jesus' name is sweeter.
THE ONLY LIGHT.
Christ, whose glory fills the skies,
Christ, the true, the only Light,
Sun of Righteousness, arise,
Triuni])!! o'er the sliades of night!
Day-spring from on high, be near!
Day-star, in my heart appear!
Dark and cheerless is the morn
Unaccom]ianied l)y Thee;
Joyless is the day's return
Till Thy mercy's beams I see;
Till they inward light impart,
Glail my eyes and war-m my heart.
Visit, then, this soul of mine.
Pierce the gloom of sin and grief!
Fill me, Radiancy Divine,
Scatter all my unbelief !
More and more Thyself display.
Shining to the perfect day.
,TESUS, LOVER OF MY SOUL.
Jesus, lover of my soul,
Let me to Tliy bosom fly,
AVhile the nearer waters roll.
While the tempest still is nigh!
Hide me, O my Saviour, hide.
Till the storm of life is past:
Safe into Thy haven guide —
receive my soul at last!
Other refuge have I none —
Hangs my helpless soul on Thee;
Leave, ah! leave me not alone —
Still support and comfort me.
All my trust on Thee is stayed.
All my help from Thee I bring:
Cover my defenceless head
With the shadow of Thy wing.
AVilt Thou not regard my call ?
Wilt Thou not regard my prayer '?
Lo! Ishik, Ifaint,"l fall —
Lo! on Thee I cast my care;
Reach me out Thy gracious hand.
While I of Thy strength receive !
Hoping against hope I stand —
Dying, and behold I live.
Thou, O Christ, art all I want —
More than all in Thee I find ;
Raise the fallen, cheer the faint.
Heal the sick, and lead the blind.
Just and holy is Thy name —
1 am all unrighteousness;
False, and full of sin I am: —
Thou art full of truth and grace.
WHEELER.
633
Plenteous grace with Thee i:
found, —
Grace to cover all my sin ;
Let the healing streams abound —
Make and keep me pure within.
Thou of life the foiuitain art —
Freely let me take of Thee;
Spring Thovi up within my heart —
Rise to all eternity.
COME, LET US ANEW.
Come, let us anew our journey pursue,
Roll round with the year,
And never stand still, till the Master
appear.
His adorable viill let us gladly fulfil,
And our talents improve.
By the patience of hope, and the
labor of love.
Our life is a dream; our time, as a
stream.
Glides swiftly away;
And the fugitive moment refuses to
stay.
The arrow is flown; the moment is
gone ;
The millennial year
Rushes on to our view, and eternity's
here.
that each in the day of his coming
may say,
" I liave fought my way through ;
1 have finished the work thou didst
give me to do."
O that each, from his Lord, may re-
ceive the glad word,
"Well and faithfully done;
*' Enter into my joy, and sit down on
my throne."
Ella Wheeler.
SECRETS.
TiiiXK not some knowledge rests with thee alone.
Why, even God's stupendous secret. Death,
We one by one, with our expiring breath.
Do, pale with wonder, seize and make our own.
The bosomed treasures of the earth are shown
Despite her careful hiding; and the air
Yields its mysterious marvels in despair.
To swell the mighty storehouse of things known.
In vain the sea expostulates and raves;
It cannot cover from the keen world's sight
The curious wonders of its coral caves.
And so, despite thy caution or thy tears.
The prying fingers of detective years
Shall drag thy secret out into the light.
634
WHITE.
Blanco White.
TO NIGHT.
Mysterious Night! when our first
parent knew
Thee from report divine, and heard
tliy name ;
Did he not tremble for this lovely
frame,
This glorious canopv of light and
Ijlue ?
Yet 'neath the curtain of translucent
dew.
Bathed in the rays of the great set-
ting flame,
Hesperus with the host of heaven
came,
And lo! creation widened in man's
view.
Who could have thought such dark-
ness lay concealed
Within thy beams, O Sun! or who
could find,
While fly, and leaf, and insect lay re-
vealed.
That to such coimtless orbs thou
madest us blind !
Why do v,e, then, shun Death with
anxious strife ? —
If Light can thus deceive, wherefore
not Life ?
Henry Kirke White.
TO AN EARLY PRIMUOSE.
Mild offspring of a dark and sullen
sire!
Whose modest form, so delicately
fine,
W^as nursed in whirling storms.
And cradled in the winds.
Thee when young Spring first ques-
tioned Winter's sway,
And dared the sturdy blusterer to the
fight.
Thee on this bank he threw
To mark his victory.
In this low vale, the promise of the
year,
Serene, thou openest to the nipping
gale,
Unnoticed and alone,
Thy tender elegance.
So virtue blooms, brought forth amid
the storms
Of chill adversity, in some lone walk
Of life she rears her head.
Obscure and unobserved ;
\Vhile every bleaching breeze that on
her blows.
Chastens her spotless purity of
breast.
And hardens her to bear
Serene the ills of life.
SOLITUDE.
It is not that my lot is low.
That bids this silent tear to flow;
It is not grief that bids me moan.
It is that I am all alone.
In woods and glens I love to roam,
When the tired hedger hies him
home ;
Or by the woodland pool to rest.
When pale the star looks on its
breast.
Yet when the silent evening sighs,
Witli hallowed airs and symphonies.
My spirit takes another tone.
And sighs that it is all alone.
The autumn leaf is sere and dead,
It floats upon the water's bed;
I would not he a leaf, to die
Without recording sorrow's sigh!
The woods and winds, with sudden
wail.
Tell all the same unvaried tale ;
I've none to smile when I am free.
And when 1 sigh, to sigh with me.
Yet in my dreams a form I view.
That thinks on me, and loves me
too;
1 start, and when the vision's flown,
1 weep that I am all alone.
ODE TO DISAPPOINTMENT.
Come, Disappointment, come!
Not in thy terrors clad ;
Come in thy meekest, saddest guise;
Thy chastening rod but terrifies
The restless and the bad.
But I recline
Beneath thy shrine,
And round my brow resigned, thy
peaceful cypress twine.
Though Fancy flies away
Before thy hollow tread,
Yet Meditation in her cell;
Hears with faint eye the lingering
knell.
That tells her hopes are dead;
And though the tear
By chance appear.
Yet she can smile, and say, ^My all
was not laid here.
Come, Disappointment, come!
Though from Hope's summit
hurled,
Still, rigid nurse, thou art forgiven.
For thou severe wert sent from
heaven
To wean me from the world ;
To turn my eye
From vanity.
And point to scenes of bliss that
never, never die.
What is this passing scene!
A peevish April day !
A little sun — a little rain,
Aud then night sweeios along the
plain.
And all things fade away.
Man (soon discussed)
Yields up his trust,
And all his hopes and fears lie with
him in the dust.
Oh, what is beauty's power ?
It flourishes and dies;
Will the cold earth its silence i)reak,
To tell how soft, how smooth a
cheek
Beneath its surface lies?
Mute, mute is all
O'er beauty's fall;
Her praise resounds no moic when
mantled in the pall.
The most beloved on earth
Not long survives to-day ;
So music past is obsolete.
And yet 'twas sweet, 'twas passing
sweet ;
But now 'tis gone away.
Thus does the shade
In memory fade.
When in forsaken tomb the form
beloved is laid.
Then since this world is vain.
And volatile and fleet.
Why should I lay up earthly joys.
Where rust corrupts, and moth de-
stroys,
And cares and sorrows eat ?
Why fly from ill
With anxious skill,
When soon this hand will freeze,
this throbbing heart be still ?
Come, Disappointment, come!
Thou art not stern to me;
Sad monitress! 1 own thy sway,
A votary sad in early day,
I bend my knee to thee.
From sun to sun
My race will run,
I only bow and say. My God, Thy
will be done.
63G
WHITNEY.
THE STANZA ADDED TO WALLER'S
" ROSE."
Yet, though thou fade,
From thy dead leaves let fragrance
rise ;
And teach the maid,
Tliat goodness Time's rude hand de-
lies,
That virtue lives when beauty dies.
TO MISFORTUNE.
Misfortune, I am young, — my chin
is bare,
And I have \\'ondered much when
men have told
How youtli was free from sorrow and
from care.
That thou should'st dwell with me,
and leave the old.
Sure dost not like me ! — Slirivelled
hag of hate.
My phiz, and thanks to thee, is
sadly long;
1 am not either, beldame, over
strong;
Nor do I wish at all to be thy mate,
For thou, sweet Fury, art my utter
hate.
Nay, shake not thus thy miserable
pate; [face;
I am yet young, and do not like thy
And lest thou should'st resume the
wild-goose chase.
I'll tell thee something all thy heat
to assuage.
Thou wilt not hit my fancy in my
age.
A LITTLE BEFORE DEATH.
Yes, 'twill be over soon. — This
sickly dream
Of life will vanish from my fever-
ish brain;
And deatb my wearied spirit will re-
deem
From this wild region of unvaried
pain.
Yon brook will glide as softly as be-
fore, —
Yon landscape smile, — yon golden
harvest grow,
Yon sprightly lark on mounting wing
will soar,
When Henry's name is heard no
more below.
I sigh when all my youthful friends
caress,
They laugh in health, and future
evils brave;
Them shall a wife and smiling chil-
dren bless,
AYhile I am mouldering in my silent
grave.
God of the just, — Thou gavest the
bitter cup;
I l)ow to thy behest, and drink it up.
Adeline D. T. Whitney.
EQUINOCTIAL.
The sun of life has crossed the line;
The summer-shine of lengthened
light
Faded and failed, till where I stand
'Tis equal day and equal night.
One after one, as dwindling hours.
Youth's glowing hopes have drop-
ped away.
And soon may barely leave the gleam
That coldly scores a winter's day.
I am not young; I am not old;
The Hush of morn, the sunset calm.
Paling and deepening, each to each.
Meet midway with a solemn charm.
One side I see the summer fields
Not yet disrobed of all their green;
While westerly, along the hills
Flame the first tints of frosty sheen.
Ah, middle point, where cloud and
storm
Make battle-groimd of this, my life !
WHITNEY.
637
Where, even-matched, the night and
(lay
Wage round me their September
strife !
I bow me to the threatening gale;
I know wlien that is overpast,
Among the peaceful harvest days,
An Indian summer comes at last I
BEHIND THE MASK.
It was an old, distorted face, —
An uncouth visage, rough and
wild, —
Yet, from behind, with laughing
grace,
Peeped the fresh beauty of a child.
And so, contrasting strange to-day,
My heart of youth doth inly ask
If half earth's wrinkled grimness
may
Be but the baby in the mask.
Behind gray hairs and furrowed bi'ow
And withered look that life puts
on,
Each, as he wears it, comes to know
How the child hides, and is not
gone.
For while the inexorable years
To saddened features fit their
mould,
Beneath the work of time and tears
Waits something that will not grow
old!
The rifted pine upon the hill.
Scarred by the lightning and the
wind.
Through bolt and blight doth nurture
still
Young fibres underneath the rind ;
And many a storm-blast, fiercely sent,
And wasted hope, and sinf id stain,
Roughen the strange integument
The struggling soul nuist wear in
pain;
Yet when she comes to claim her own,
Heaven's angel, happily, shall not
ask
For that last look the world hath
known,
But for the face behind the mask !
THE THREE LIGHTS.
My window that looks down the west,
Where the cloud-thrones and islands
rest.
One evening, to my random sight.
Showed forth this picture of delight.
The shifting glories were all gone;
The clear blue stillness coming on;
And the soft shade, 'twixt day and
night
Held the old earth in tender light.
Up in the ether hung the horn
Of a young moon; and, newly born
From out the shadows, trembled far
The shining of a single star.
Only a hand's breadth was between:
So close they seemed, so sweet-
serene.
As if in heaven some child and
mother.
With peace untold, had found each
other.
Then my glance fell from that fair
sky
A little down, yet very nigh.
Just where the neighboring tree-tops
made
A lifted line of billowy shade, —
And from the earth-dark twinkled
clear
One other spark, of human cheer;
A home-smile, telling where there
stood
A farmer's house beneath the Avood.
Only these three in all the space;
Far telegraphs of various place.
Which seeing, this glad thought was
mine, —
Be it but little oandle-shine.
638
WHITNEY.
Oi- golden disk of moon that swings
Nearest of ail tlie lieavenly things,
Or world in awful distance small,
One Light doth feed and link them
all!
" / iriLL ABIDE IX THINE HOUSE."
Among so many, can He care ?
Can special love be everywhere ?
A myriad homes, — a myriad ways, —
And God's eye over every place.
Orer ; but in ? The world is full ;
A grand omnipotence must rule;
But is there life that doth abide
With mine own living, side by side ?
So many, and so wide abroad :
Can any heart have all of God ?
From the great spaces, vague and dim.
May one small household gather Him?
I asked : my soul bethought of this : —
In just that very place of his
AVhere He hath put and keepeth you,
(Jod hath no other thing to do!
HEARTH-GLOW.
ly the fireshine at the twilight.
The pictui'es that I see
Are less with mimic landscape bright
Than with life and mystery.
Where the embers flush and flicker
With their iialpitating glow,
I see, titfuller and quicker,
Heart-pulses come and go.
And here and there, with eager flame,
A little tongue of light
Upreaches eai-nestly to claina
A somewhat out of sight.
I know, with instinct sure and high,
A somewhat must be there;
Else should the fiery impulse die.
In ashes of despair.
Through the red ti'acery I discern
A parable siddime ;
A solemn myth of souls that burn
In ordeals of time.
SUNLIGHT AND STAIUJGHT.
Got) sets some souls in shade, alone;
Tliey have no daylight of their own:
Only in lives of happier ones
They see the shine of distant suns.
God knows. Content thee with thy
night.
Thy greater heaven hath grander
light.
To-day is close; the hours are small;
Thou sit'st afar, and hast them all.
Lose the less joy that doth but blind ;
Keach forth a larger bliss to find.
To-day is brief : the inclusive spheres
Kain raptures of a thousand yeai's.
LAIir^.
My little maiden of four years old —
No myth, but a genuine child is she.
With her bronze-brown eyes and her curls of gold —
Came, quite in disgust, one day, to me.
Rubbing her shoulder Avith rosy palm.
As the loathsome touch seemed yet to thrill her,
She cried, '' O mother! I found on my arm
A horrible, crawling caterpillar! "
And with mischievous smile she could scarcely smother,
Yet a glance in its daring, half awed, half shy,
She added, '• While they were about it, mother
I wish they'd just finished the butterfly!"
They were words to the thought of the soul that turns
From the coarser form of a partial growth,
Eeproaching the intinite patience that yearns
With an unknown glory to crown them hoth.
Ah, look thou largely, with lenient eyes,
On wliatso beside tliee may creep and cling,
For the possible glory that underlies
The passing phase of the meanest thing !
What if God's great angels, whose waiting love
Beholdeth our pitiful life below
From the holy height of their heaven above.
Could n't bear with the worm till the wings should grow ?
Elizabeth H. Whittier.
CHAIUTY.
The pilgrim and stranger, who, \ For gifts, in his name, of food and
thi'ough the day, I rest,
Holds over the desert his trackless j The tents of Islam, of God are
way, I blest.
Where the terrible sands no shade
have known.
No sound of life save his camel's
moan,
Hears, at last, through the mercy of
Allah to all,
From his tent-door, at evening, the
Bedouin's call:
" Whoever thou art, whose need is
great,
In the name of God, the Compas-
sionate
And Merciful One, for thee I
wait!"
Thou, who hast faith in the Christ
above,
Shall the Koran teach thee the Law
of Love ?
O Christian ! — open thy heart and
door, —
Cry, east and west, to the wandering
poor, —
" Whoever thou art, whose need is
great,
In the name of Christ, the Compas-
sionate
And Merciful One, for thee I
wait! "
John G.
THE BAREFOOT BOY.
Blessings on thee, little man.
Barefoot boy, with cheek of tan !
With thy turned-up pantaloons,
And thy merry whistled tunes;
With thy red lip, redder still
Kissed by strawberries on the hill;
Whittier.
With the sunshine on thy face,
Through thy torn brim's jaunty grace;
From my heart I give thee joy, —
I was once a barefoot boy !
Prince thou art, — the grown-up man
Only is republican.
Let the million-dollared ride!
Barefoot, trudging at his side.
640
WHITTIER.
Thou hast more than he can buy
In the reach of ear and eye, —
(Jutward sunshine, inward joy:
Blessings on thee, barefoot boy !
Oh, for boyhood's painless play,
Sleep that wakes in laughing day,
Health that mocks the doctor's rules,
Knowledge never learned in schools,
Of the wild bee's morning chase,
Of the Avild-flower's time and place.
Flight of fowl and habitude
( )f the tenants of the wood ;
How the tortoise bears his shell,
How the woodchuck digs his cell,
And the ground-mole sinks his well;
How the robin feeds her young.
How the oriole's nest is hung;
AVhere the whitest lilies blow,
Where the freshest berries grow,
Where the ground-nut trails its vine,
Where the wood-grape's clusters
shine ;
Of the black wasp's cunning way,
Mason of his walls of clay,
And the architectural plans
Of gray hornet artisans ! —
For, eschewing books and tasks,
Nature answers all he asks ;
Hand in hand with her he walks,
Face to face with her he talks,
Part and parcel of her joy, —
Blessings on the barefoot boy !
Oh. for boyhood's time of June,
Crowding years in one brief moon,
When all things I heard or saw,
Me, their master, waited for.
I was rich in flowers and trees,
Huumiing-birds and honey-bees;
For my sport the squirrel played,
Plied the snouted mole his spade;
For my taste the blackberry cone
Purpled over hedge and stone;
Laughed tlit> brook for my delight
Thi-ough the day and through the
night.
Whispering at the garden wall,
Talked Avith me from fall to fall ;
Mine the sand-rimmed pickerel pond,
Mine the walnut slopes beyond.
Mine, on bending orchard trees,
Apples of Hesperides !
Still as my liorizon grew
Larger grew my riches too ;
All the world I saw or knew
Seemed a complex Chinese toy,
Fashioned for a barefoot boy !
Oh, for festal dainties spread,
IJke my bowl of milk and bread, —
Pewter spoon and bowl of wood.
On the door-stone, gray and rude !
O'er me, like a regal tent,
Cloudy-ribbed, the sunset bent.
Purple-curtained, fringed with gold;
Looped in many a wind-swung fold ;
While for music came the play
Of the pied frogs' orchestra;
And, to light the noisy choir,
Lit the fly his lamp of fire.
I was monarch ; pomp and joy
Waited on the barefoot boy.
Cheerily, then, my little man,
Live and laugh, as boyhood can!
Though the flinty slopes be hard.
Stubble - speared the new - mown
sward.
Every morn shall lead thee through
Fresh baptisms of the dew ;
Every evening from thy feet
Shall the cool wind kiss the heat.
All too soon these feet must hide
In the prison cells of pride.
Lose the freedom of tlie sod.
Like a colt's for work be shod.
Made to tread the mills of toil.
Up and down in ceaseless moil :
Happy if their track be found
Never on forbidden grountl ;
Happy if they sink not in
Quick and treacherous sands of sin.
Ah ! that thou couldst know thy joy,
Ere it passes, barefoot boy !
ly SCHOOL-DA VS.
Still sits the school-house by the
road,
A ragged beggar sunning;
Around it still the sumachs grow.
And blackberry-vines are running.
Within, the master's desk is seen.
Deep scarred by raps official ;
The warping floor, the battered seats,
The jack-knife's carved initial;
The charcoal frescoes on its wall;
Its clooi'"s worn sill, hetraying
The feet that, creeping slow to school,
Went storming out to playing!
Long years ago a winter sun
IShone over it at setting ;
Lit up its western window-panes,
And low eaves' icy fretting.
It touched the tangled golden curls,
Antl brown eyes full of grieving,
Of one wlio still her steps delayed
When all the school were leaving.
For near her stood the little boy
Her childish favor singled :
His cap ijulled low upon a face
Where pride and shame were min-
gled.
Pushing with restless feet the snow
To right and left, he lingered; —
As restlessly her tiny hands
The blue-checked apron fingered.
He saw^ her lift her eyes; he felt
The soft hand's light caressing,
And heai-d the tremble of her voice.
As if a fault confessing.
" I'm sorry that I spelt the word :
I hate to go above you.
Because."' — the brown eyes lower
fell. —
" Because, you see, I love you! "
Still memory to a gray-haired man
That sweet child-face is showing.
Dear girl ! the grasses on her grave
Have forty years been growing!
He lives to learn, in life's hard
school
How few who pass above him
Lament their triumph and liis loss.
Like her, — because they love Mm.
MY PSALM.
I .AiouKX no more my vanished yeai's:
Beneath a tender rain.
An April rain of smiles and tears,
My heart is young again.
The west-winds blow, and, singing
low,
I hear tlie glad streams run;
The windows of my soul I throw
Wide open to the sun.
No longer foi-ward nor behind
I look in hope or fear;
But, grateful take the good I find,
The best of now and here.
I plough no more a desert land.
To harvest weed and tare:
The manna droi:)ping from (iod's
hand
Rebukes my painful care.
I break my pilgrim staff, — I lay
Aside the toiling oar;
The angel sought so far away
I welcome at my door.
The airs of spring may never play
Among the ripening corn.
Nor freshness of the liowers of May
Blow through the autumn morn ;
Yet shall the blue-eyed gentian look
Through fringed lids to heaven.
And the pale aster in the brook
Shall see its image given :
The woods shall wear their robes of
praise,
The soxith-wind softly sigh,
And sweet, calm days in golden haze
Melt down the amber sky.
Not less shall manly deed and word
Rebuke an age of w^rong ;
The graven flowers that wreathe the
sword
Make not the blade less strong.
But smiting hands shall learn to
heal, —
To build as to destroy ;
Nor less my heart for others feel
That I tlie more enjoy.
All as God wills, who wisely heeds
To give or to withhold.
And knoweth nicMe of all my- needs
Than all my prayers have told !
642
WHITTIER.
Enough that blessiiiijs undeserved
Have marked my erring track; —
That wheresoe'er my feet have
swerved,
His chastening turned me back : —
That more and more a Providence
Of love is understood.
Making tlie springs of time and sense
Sweet with eternal good ; —
That death seems but a covered way
Which opens into light.
Wherein no blinded child can stray
Beyond the Father's sight; —
That care and trial seem at last.
Through Memory's sunset air,
Like mountain-ranges overpast.
In purple distance fair; —
That all the jarring notes of life
Seem blending in a psalm,
And all the angles of its strife
Slow rounding into calm.
And so the shadows fall apart,
And so the west-winds i^lay ;
And all the windows of my heart
I open to the day.
BARBARA FRIETCHIE.
Up from the meadows rich with corn.
Clear in the cool September morn.
The cluster' d spires of Frederick
stand.
Green-walled by the hills of Maryland ;
Kound about them orchards sweep,
Apple and peach-tree fruited deej),
Fair as a garden of the Lord,
To the eyes of the famished rebel
horde,
On that pleasant morn of the early
fall.
When Lee marched over the moun-
tain wall,
Over the mountains winding down.
Horse and foot, into Frederick town.
Forty flags with their silver stars.
Forty flags with their crimson bars.
Flapped in the morning wind: the
sim
Of noon looked down, and saw not
one.
Up rose old Barbara Frietchie then.
Bowed with her fourscore years and
ten ;
Bravest of all in Frederick town.
She took up the flag the men hauled
down.
In her attic window the staff she set,
To show that one heart was loyal yet.
Up the street came the rebel tread,
Stonewall Jackson riding ahead.
Under his slouched hat left and right
He glanced: the old flag met his
" sight.
" Halt !" — the dust-brown ranks stood
fast;
•'Fire!" — out blazed the rifle-blast.
It shivered the window, pane and
sash.
It rent the banner with seam and
gash.
Quick, as it fell from the broken statt.
Dame Barbara snatched the silken
scarf.
She leaned far out on the window-
sill.
And shook it forth with a royal will.
"Shoot, if you must, this old gray
head.
But spare your country's flag." she
said.
A shade of sadness, a blush of shame,
Over the face of the leader came ;
The nobler nature within him stirr'd
To life at that woman's deed and
word.
''Who touches a hair of yon gray head
Dies like a dog! March on!" he said.
WHITTIER.
643
All clay long through Frederick street
Sounded the tread of marching feet ;
All daj' long that free flag tossed
Over the heads of the rebel host.
Ever its torn folds rose and fell
On the loyal winds that loved it well;
And, through the hill-gaps, sunset
light
Shone over it Mith a warm good-
night.
Barbara Frietchie's work is o'er.
And the rebel rides on his raids no
more.
Honor to her! and let a tear
Fall, for her sake, on Stonewall's
bier.
Over Barbara Frietchie's grave.
Flag of Freedom and Union wave !
Peace and order and beauty draw
Round thy symbol of light and law:
And ever the stars above look down
On thy stars below in Frederick town.
MAUD MULLEli.
Matd Muller, on a summer's day,
Raked the meadoM' sweet with hay.
Beneath her torn hat glowed the
wealth
Of simple beauty and rustic health.
Singing, she wrought, and her merry
glee
The mock-bird echoed from his tree.
But, when she glanced to the far-off
town ,
White from its hill-slope looking
down,
The sweet song died, and a vague
imrest
And a nameless longing filled her
breast, —
A wish that she hardly dared to own,
For something better than she had
known.
The judge rode slowly down the lane,
Smoothing his horse's chestnut mane.
He drew his bridle in the shade
Of the apple-trees to greet the maid :
And asked a draught from the spring
that flowed
Through the meadow across the road.
She stooped where the cool spring
bubbled np.
And filled for him her small tin cup.
And blushed as she gave it. looking
down
On her feet so bare, and her tattered
gown.
" Thanks," said the judge, " a
sweeter draught
From a fairer hand was never
quaffed."
He spoke of the grass and flowers
and trees.
Of the singing birds and the hum-
ming bees;
Then talked of the haying, and won-
dered whether
The cloud in the Avest would bring
foul weather.
And Maud forgot her brier-torn gown.
And her graceful ankles bare and
brown ;
And listened, while a pleased surprise
Looked from her long-lashed hazel
eyes.
At last, like one mIio for delay
Seeks a vain excuse, he rode away.
Maud Mnller looked and sighed:
" Ah me!
That I the judge's bride might be!
"He Avould dress me up in silks so
fine.
And praise and toast me at his wine.
644
WIIITTIER.
" My father should wear a broadcloth
coat;
My brother should sail a painted boat.
"I'd dress my mother so grand and
gay,
And the baby should have a new toy
each day.
" And I'd feed the hungry, and clothe
the poor,
And all should bless me who left our
door. ' '
The judge looked back as he climbed
the hill,
And saw Maud Muller standmg still.
" A form more fair, a face more
sweet.
Ne'er hath it been my lot to meet.
" And her modest answer and grace-
ful air
Show her wise and good as she is fair.
" Would she were mine, and I to-day.
Like her, a harvester of hay :
"No doulttful balance of rights and
wrongs.
Nor weary lawyers with endless
tongues,
" But low of cattle and song of birds.
And health, and quiet, and loving
words."
But he thought of his sisters proud
and cold.
And his mother vain of her rank and
gold.
So, closing his heart, the judge rode
on.
And Maud was left in the field alone.
But the lawyers smiled that after-
noon.
When he hummed in court an old
love-tune;
And the young girl mused beside the
well.
Till the rain on the unraked clover
fell.
He wedded a wife of richest dower.
Who lived for fashion, as he for
power.
Yet oft, in his marble hearth's bright
glow,
He watched a picture come and go :
And sweet Maud Muller's hazel eyes
Looked out in their innocent surprise.
Oft, when the wine in his glass was
red.
He longed for the wayside well in-
stead,
And closed his eyes on his garnished
rooms.
To dream of meadows and clover-
blooms.
And the proud man sighed, with a
secret pain :
' ' Ah, that I were free again !
" Free as when I rode that day.
Where the barefoot maiden raked
her hay."
She wedded a man unlearned and
poor,
And many children played round
her door.
But care, and sorrow, and childbirth
pain.
Left their traces on heart and brain.
And oft, when the summer sun shone
hot
On the new-mown hay in the meadow
lot.
And she heard the little spring-brook
fall
Over the roadside, through the wall,
In the shade of the apple-tree again
She saw a rider draw his rein,
And, gazing down, with timid grace.
She felt his pleased eyes read her
face.
Sometimes her narrow kitclien walls
Stretched away into stately halls;
The weary wheel to a spinnet turned,
The tallow candle an astral burned,
WllITTlER.
645
And for him who sat by the chimney
lug,
Dozing and grumbling o'er pipe and
luug,
A manly form at her side she saw,
And joy was duty, and love was law.
Then she took up her burden of life
again,
Saying only, " It might have been."
Alas, for maiden, alas, for judge.
For rich repiner and household
drudge !
God pity them both, and pity us all,
Who vainly the dreams of youth re-
call.
For of all sad words of tongue or
pen,
The saddest are these: "It might
have been! "
Ah, well ! for us all some sweet hope
lies
Deeply buried from human eyes ;
And, in the hereafter, angels may
Eoll the stone from its grave away !
[From The Tvnf on fhe Beach.— The Grave
bij the Lake.']
UXn'EIlSAL SAL VA TIOX.
O THE generations old
Over whom no church-bells tolled,
Christless, lifting up blind eyes
To the silence of the skies !
For the innumerable dead
Is my soul disquieted,
Hearest thou, O of little faith.
What to thee the mountain saith.
What is whispered by the trees ? —
" Cast on God thy care for these;
Trust him, if Ihy sight be dim;
Doubt for them is doubt of Him.
"Blind must be their close-shut eyes
Where like night the sunshine lies,
Fiery-linked the self-forged chain
Binding ever sin to pain.
Strong their prison-house of will.
But without He waitetli still.
"Xot with hatred's undertow
Doth the IjOvc Eternal flow ;
Every chain that spirits wear
Crumbles in the breath of prayer;
And the i>enitent's desire
Opens every gate of lire.
"Still Thy love, O Christ arisen,
Yearns to reach these souls in prison !
Through all depths of sin and loss
Drops the plummet of Thy cross !
Never yet abyss was found
Deeper than that cross could sound !' '
[From The Tent on the /leach. — Abraham
Davenport.]
KA T URE' S RE VEUEN ( E .
The harp at Nature's advent, strung
Has never ceased to play :
The song the stars of morning sung
Has never died away.
And prayer is made, and praise is
given,
By ail things near and far:
The ocean looketh up to heaven.
And mirrors every star.
Its waves are kneeling on the strand.
As kneels the human knee.
Their white locks bowing to the sand,
The priesthood of the sea !
They pour their glittering treasures
forth.
Their gifts of pearl they bring,
And all the listening hills of earth
Take up the song they sing.
The green earth sends her incense
up
From many a mountain shrine:
From folded leaf and dewy cup
She pours her sacred wine.
The mists above the morning rills
Else white as wings of prayer;
The altar-curtains of the hills
Are sunset's purple air.
The winds with hymns of praise are
loud.
Or low Avith sobs of pain, —
The thunder-organ of the cloud.
The dropping tears of rain.
G4G
WHITTIER.
With drooping head and branches
crossed
The twihght forest grieves,
Or spealvs with tongues of Pentecost
From all its sunlit leaves.
The blue sky is the teniphvs arch,
Its transept earth and air.
The music of its starry march
The chorus of a prayer.
So Nature keeps the reverent frame
With which her years began, '
And all her signs and voices shame
The prayerless heart of man.
THE PRESSED GENTIAN.
The time of gifts has come again,
And, on my northern window-pane.
Outlined against the day's brief light,
A Christmas token hangs in sight.
The wayside travellers, as they pass,
Mark the gray disk of clouded glass ;
And the dull blankness seems, per-
chance,
Folly to their wise ignorance.
They cannot from their outlook see
The perfect grace it hath for me ;
For there the llower, whose fringes
through
The frosty breath of autumn blew.
Turns from without its face of bloom
To the warm tropic of my room.
As fair as when beside its brook
The hue of bending skies it took.
So, from the trodden ways of earth.
Seem some sweet souls who veil
their worth.
And offer to the careless glance
The clouding gray of circumstance.
They blossom best where hearth-fires
burn.
To loving eyes alone they turn
The flowers of inward grace, that
hide
Their beauty from the world outside.
But deeper meanings come to me.
My half-immortal flower, from thee !
Man judges from a partial view,
None ever yet his brother knew;
The Eternal Eye that sees the whole
May better read the darkened soul,
And And, to outward senses denied.
The flower upon its inmost side!
MY PLAYMATE.
The pines were dark on Ilamoth hill,
Their song was soft and low :
The blossoms in the sweet May wind
Were falling like the snow.
The blossoms drifted at our feet.
The orchard birds sang clear :
The sweetest and the saddest day
It seemed of all the year.
For, more to me than birds or flow-
ers.
My playmate left her home.
And took with her the laughing
spring.
The music and the bloom.
She kissed the lips of kith and kin,
She laid her hand in mine ;
AVhat more could ask the bashful
boy
Who fed her father' s kine ?
She left us in the bloom of May :
The constant years told o'er
Their seasons with as swett May
morns.
But she came back no more.
I walk, with noiseless feet, the round
Of uneventful years;
Still o'er and o'er I sow the spring
And reap the autumn ears.
She lives where all the golden year
Her summer roses blow ;
The dusky children of the sun
Before her come and go.
There haply with her jewelled hands
She smooths her silken gown, —
No more the homespun lap wherein
1 shook the walnuts dow n.
nc PINES WERE DARK ON RAMOTH HILL.
Page 64b
WILDE.
647
The wild grapes wait us by the brook,
Tlie brown nuts on the liill,
And still the May-day flowers make
sweet
The woods of Follymill.
The lilies blossom in the pond,
The bird builds iu the tree,
The dark pines sing on Kamoth hill
The slow song of the sea.
I wonder if she thinks of them,
And how the old time seems. —
If ever the pines of Kamoth wood.
Are sounding in her dreams.
I see her face, I hear her voice:
Does she remember mine ?
And what to her is now the boy
Who fed her father's kine '?
What cares she that the orioles build
For other eyes than ours, —
That other hands with nuts are ttlled,
And other laps with flowers ?
O playmate in the golden time!
Our mossy seat is green.
Its fringing violets blossom yet,
The old trees o'er it lean.
The winds so sweet with birch and
fern
A sweeter memory l)low;
And there in spring the vecries sing
The songs of long ago.
And still the pines of Eamoth wood
Are moaning like the sea, —
The moaning of the sea of change
Between myself and thee!
Oscar Wilde.
EASTER-DAY.
The silver trumpets rang across the
dome :
The people knelt upon the ground
with awe :
And borne upon the necks of men
I saw.
Like some great god, the Holy Lord
of Rome.
I'riest-like, he wore a robe more
white than foam.
And, king-like, swathed himself
in royal red.
Three crowns of gold rose high
upon his head :
In splendor and in light the Pope
passed home.
My heart stole back across wide
wastes of years
To One who wandered by a
lonely sea.
And sought in vain for any place
of rest:
"Foxes have holes, and every bird
its nest,
I, only I. nuist wander wearily,
And bruise my feet, and drink
wine salt with tears."
MADONNA MIA.
A i,iLY-GiRL, not made for this
world's pain.
With brown, soft hair close braided
by her ears.
And longing eyes half veiled by
slumberous tears
Like bluest water seen through mists
of rain:
Pale cheeks whereon no love hath
left its stain,
Red underlip drawn in for fear of
love.
And white throat, whiter than the
silvered dove.
Through whose wan marble creeps
one iHu-ple vein.
Yet, though my lips shall praise her
without cease.
Even to kiss her feet I am not
bold, [of awe.
Being o'ershadowed by the wings
Like Dante, when he stootl with
Beatrice
Beneath the flaming lion's breast,
and saw
The seventh Crystal, and the Stair
of Gold.
648
WILDE.
SONNET.
ON HEARING THE DIES IR^ SUNG IN
THE SISTINE CHAPEL.
Nay, Lord, not thus! white lilies in
the spring,
Sad olive-groves, or silver-breasted
dove.
Teach nie more clearly of Thy life
and love
Than terrors of red flame and thim-
dering.
The empurpled vines dear memories
of Thee bring:
A bird at evening Oying to its nest.
Tells me of One who had no place
of rest:
I think it is of Thee the sparrows
sing.
Come rather on some autumn after-
noon.
When red and brown are burnished
on the leaves,
And the tields echo to the gleaner's
song.
Come when the splendid fulness of
the moon
Looks down upon the rows of
golden sheaves.
And reap Thy harvest : we have
waited long.
IMPRESSION DU MATIN.
The Thames nocturne of blue and
gold
Changed to a harmony in gray:
A barge with ochre-colored hay
Dropt from the wharf: and chill and
cold
The yellow fog came creeping down
The bridges, till the houses' walls
Seemed changed to shadows, and
St. Paul's
Loomed like a bubble o'er the town.
Then suddenly arose the clang
Of waking life; the streets were
stirred
With country wagons : and a bird
Flew to the glistening roofs and sang.
But one pale woman all alone.
The daylight kissing her wan hair.
Loitered beneath the gas-lamps'
flare,
With lips of flame and heart of stone.
.S' UNUISE.
The sky is laced with fitful red.
The circling mists and shadows
flee,
The dawn is rising from the sea,
Like a white lady from her bed.
And jagged brazen arrows fall
Athwart the feathers of the night.
And a long wave of yellow liglit
Breaks silently on tower and hall,
And spreading wide across the
wold
Wakes into flight some fluttering
bird.
And all the chestnut tops are
stirred
And all the branches streaked with
gold.
SILHOUETTES.
The sea is flecked with bars of gray
The dull dead wind is out of tmie,
And like a withered leaf the moon
Is blown across the stormy bay.
Etched clear upon the pallid sand
The black boat lies: a sailor boy
Clambers aboard in careless joy
With laughing face and gleaming
hand.
And overhead the curlews cry.
Where through the dusky upland
grass
The young brown-throated reapers
pass.
Like silhouettes against the sky.
HEQUIESCAT.
Tread lightly, she is near
Under the snow.
Speak gently, she can hear
The daisies grow.
All her bright golden hair
Tarnished with rust,
She that was young and fair
Fallen to dust.
Lily-like, white as snow,
She liardly knew
She was a woman, so
Sweetly she grew.
Coffin-board, heavy stone.
Lie on her breast,
I vex my heart alone
She is at rest.
Peace, peace, she cannot hear
Lyre or sonnet.
All my life's buried here,
Heap eartli upon it.
Richard Henry Wilde.
MY LIFE IS LIKE THE SUMMER ROSE.
My life is like the summer rose
That opens to the morning sky,
But ere the shades of evening close
Is scattered on the ground — to die.
Yet on the rose's humble bed
The sweetest dews of night are shed,
As if she wept the waste to see, —
But none shall weep a tear for me !
My life is like the autumn leaf.
That trembles in tlie moon's pale
ray!
Its hold is frail, its date is brief;
Restless, and soon to pass away !
Yet, ere that leaf shall fall and fade,
The parent tree will mourn its shade.
The winds bewail the leafless tree, —
But none shall breathe a sigh for me I
My life is like the prints which feet
Have left on Tampa's desert strand ;
Soon as the rising tide shall beat,
All trace will vanish from the sand ;
Yet, as if grieving to efface
All vestige of the human race.
On that lone shore loud moans the
sea, —
But none, alas ! shall mourn for me !
TO THE MOCKING BIRD.
AVinged mimic of the woods I thou
motley fool !
Who shall thy gay buffoonery de-
scribe ?
Thine ever-ready notes of ridicule
Pursue thy fellows still with jest and
gibe:
Wit, sophist, songster, Yorick of thy
tribe,
Thou sportive satirist of Nature's
school ;
To thee, the palm of scoffing, we as-
cribe,
Arch-mocker and mad abbot of mis-
rule !
For such thou art by day — but all
night long
Thou pour' St a soft, sweet, pensive,
solemn, strain,
As if thou didst, in this thy moon-
light song.
Like to the melancholy Jacques com-
plain, —
Musing on falsehood, folly, sin, and
wrong.
And sighing for thy motley coat
again.
650
WILLIAMS — WILLIS.
Helen Maria Williams.
WHILST THEE I SEEK.
Whilst Thee 1 seek, protecting
Power !
Be my vain wislies stilled ;
And may this consecrated liour
Witli better hopes be tilled.
Tlay love the power of thought be-
stowed, —
'J'o Thee my thoughts would soar :
Thy mercy o'er my life has flowed;
That mercy I adore.
In each event of life, how clear
Thy ruling hand I see !
Each blessing to my soul most dear.
Because conferred by Thee.
In every joy that crowns my days.
In every pain I bear.
My heart sliall find deliglit in praise,
Or seek relief in prayer.
When gladness wings my favored
hour.
Thy love my thoughts shall fill ;
Resigned, when storms of sorrow
lower,
My soul shall meet Thy will.
My lifted eye, without a tear,
The gathering storm sliall see ;
My steadfast heart shall know no
fear;
That heart will rest on Thee.
SOXNET TO HOPE.
On, ever skilled to wear tlie form we
love.
To bid the shapes of fear and grief
depart, —
Come, gentle Hope! with one gay
smile remove
Tlie lasting sadness of an aching
heart.
Thy voice, benign enchantress! let
me hear;
Say that for me some pleasures yet
shall bloom;
That Fancy's radiance. Friendship's
precious tear,
Shall soften or shall chase misfor-
tiuie's gloom.
But come not glowing in the dazzling
ray
Which once with dear illusions
charmed my eye;
Oh, strew no more, sweet flatterer,
on my way
The flowers I fondly thought too
l)right to die.
Visions less fair will soothe my pen-
sive breast.
That asks not happiness, but longs
for rest.
Nathaniel Parker Willis.
TO A CITY PIGEON.
Stoop to my window, thou beautiful
dove !
Tliy daily visits have touched my love.
I watcli thy coming, and list the note
That stirs so low in thy mellow
throat.
And my joy is high
To catch the glance of thy gentle eye.
Why dost thou sit on the heated
eaves.
And forsake the wood with its fresh-
ened leaves ?
Why dost thou liaunt the sultry
street.
When the paths of the forest are cool
and sweet ?
How canst thou bear
This noise of people — this sultry air ?
Thou alone of the feathered race
Dost look unscared on the human
face;
Thou alone, with a wing to flee,
Dost love Avith man in his haunts
to be;
And the " gentle dove"
Has become a name for trust and
love.
A holy gift is thine, sweet bird!
Thou'rt named with childhood's ear-
liest word !
Thou'rt linked with all that is fresh
and wild
In the prisoned thoughts of the city
child;
And thy glossy wings
Are its brightest image of moving
things.
It is no light chance. Thou art set
apart.
Wisely by Him who has tamed thy
heart,
To stir the love for the bright and
fair
Tliat else were sealed in this crowded
air;
I sometimes dream
Angelic rays from thy pinions stream.
Come, then, ever, when daylight
leaves
The page I read, to my humble
eaves.
And wash thy breast in the hollow
spout,
And nun-mur thy low sweet music
out!
I hear and see
Lessons of heaven, sweet bird, in
thee!
SATURDAY AFTERNOOX.
I LOVE to look on a scene like
this.
Of wild and careless play.
And persuade myself that I am not
old.
And my locks are not yet gray;
For it stirs the blood in an old man's
heart,
And )nakes his pulses fly.
To catch the thrill of a happy voice,
And the light of a pleasant eye.
I have walked the world for fourscore
years ;
And they say that I am old,
That my heart is ripe for the reaper.
Death,
And my years are well-nigh told.
It is very true ; it is very true ;
I'm old, and '* I 'bide my time:"
But my heart will leap at a scene like
this,
xYnd I half renew my prime.
Play on, play on ; I am with you there,
In the midst of your merry ring:
I can feel the thrill of the daring
jump,
And the rush of the breathless
swing.
I hide with you in the fragrant hay.
And 1 whoop the smothered call,
And my feet slip up on the seedy Hoor,
And I care not for the fall.
I am willing to die Mhen my time
shall come.
And I shall be glad to go ;
For the world at best is a weary place.
And my pulse is getting low ;
But the grave is dark, and the heart
will fail
In treading its gloomy way;
And it wiles my heart from its dreari-
ness
To see the young so gay.
ON THE PICTURE OF A " CHILD
TIRED OF PL A F."
TiKED of play ! tired of play !
What hast thou done this livelong
day ?
The birds are silent, and so is the bee;
The sun is creeping up steeple and
tree ;
The doves have flown to the shelter-
ing eaves.
And the nests are dark with the
drooping leaves;
652
WILLIS.
Twilight gathers, and day is done —
How hastthou spent it — restless one ?
Playing ? Bnt what hast thon done
beside,
To tell thy mother at eventide?
What promise of morn is left un-
broken ?
What kind word to thy playmate
spoken ?
Whom hast thou pitied, and whom
forgiven ?
How with thy faults has duty striven ?
What hast thou learned by field and
hill.
By greenwood path, and by singing
rill '?
There will come an eve to a longer
day,
That will find thee tired — but not of
play?
And thou wilt lean, as thou leanest
now.
With drooping limbs and aching
brow,
And wish the shadows would faster
creep.
And long to go to thy quiet sleep.
AVell \vere it then if thine aching
bi-ow
Were as free from sin and shame as
now !
Well for thee if thy lip could tell
A tale like this of a day spent
well ;
If thine open hand hath relieved dis-
tress.
If thy j)ity hath sprung to wretched-
ness;
If thou hast forgiven the sore offence,
And humbled thy heart with peni-
tence;
If Nature's voices have spoken to
thee
With her holy meanings eloquently ;
If every creature hath won thy love.
From the creeping worm to the brood-
ing dove ;
If never a sad, low-spoken word
Hath plead with thy human heart
unheard, —
Then, when the night steals on, as
now.
It will bring relief to thine aching
brow.
And, with joy and jieace at the
thought of rest.
Thou wilt sink to sleep on thy
motlier's breast.
THE BURIAL OF THE CHAMPION
OF HIS CLASS.
Ye've gathered to your place of
prayer
With slow and measured tread :
Your ranks are full, your mates all
there —
But the soul of one has fled.
He was the proudest in his strength.
The manliest of ye all;
Why lies he at that fearf u.l length.
And ye around his pall ?
Ye reckon it in days, since he
Strode up that foot-worn aisle,
With his dark eye flashing gloriously,
And his lip wreathed with a smile.
Oh, had it been but told you then.
To mark wliose lamp was dim —
From out yon rank of fresh-lipped
men.
Would ye have singled him ?
Whose was the sinewy arm that flung
Defiance to the ring ?
Whose laugh of victory loudest rung —
Yet not for glorying ?
AVhose heart, in generous deed and
thought.
No rivalry might brook.
And yet distinction claiming not ?
There lies he — go and look!
On now — his requiem is done.
The last deep prayer is said —
On to his burial, conn-ades — on,
With a friend and brother dead!
Slow — for it presses heavily —
It is a man ye bear!
Slow, for our thoughts dwell wearily
On the gallant sleeper there.
WILLIS.
653
Tread lightly, comrades ! — we have
laid
His dark locks on his brow —
Like life — save deeper light and
shade :
We'll not disturb them now.
Tread lightly — for 'tis beautiful,
That blue-veined eyelid's sleep,
Hiding the eye, death left so dull —
Its shimber we will keep.
Eest now ! his journeying is done —
Your feet are on his sod —
Death's blow has felled your cham-
pion —
He waiteth here his God.
Ay — turn and weep — 'tis manliness
To be heart-broken here —
For the grave of one, the best of us,
Is watered by the tear.
ro GIULIA GUIS I.
AFTER HEARING HER IN "ANNA BO-
LENA."
"When the rose is brightest,
Its bloom will soonest die;
When burns the meteor l)rightest,
'Twill vanish from the sky.
If Death but wait until delight
O'errun the heart, like wine.
And break the cup when brimming
qtiite,
1 die — for thou hast poured to-night
The last drop into mine.
UNSEEN SPIRITS.
The shadows lay along Broadway,
'Twas near the twilight-tide —
And slowly there a lady fair
Was walking in her pride.
Alone walked she; but, viewlessly,
Walked spirits at her side.
Peace charmed the street beneath her
feet,
And Honor charmed the air;
And all astir looked kind on her,
And called her good as fair —
For all God ever gave to her
yiie kept with chary care.
She kept with care her beauties rare
From lovers warm and true —
For her heart was cold to all but
gold.
And the rich came not to woo —
But honored well are charms to sell
If priests the selling do.
Now walking there was one more
fair —
A slight girl, lily-pale;
And she had Unseen company
To make the spirit quail —
'Twixt Want and Scorn she walked
forlorn,
xVnd nothing could avail.
No mercy now can clear her brow
For this world's peace to pray;
For, as love's wild prayer dissolved
in air.
Her womafi's heart gave way! —
But the sin forgiven by Christ in
heaven
By man is cursed alway !
THE BELFRY PIGEON.
Ox the cross-beam under the Old
South bell
The nest of a pigeon is builded
well.
In summer and winter that bird is
there.
Out and in with the morning air:
I love to see him track the street.
With his wary eye and active feet ;
And I often watch him as he springs,
Circling the steeple with easy M'ings,
Till across the dial his shade has
passed.
And the belfry edge is gained at last.
'Tis a bird I love, with its brooding
note.
And the trembling throb in its mot-
tled throat;
There's a human look in its swelling
breast.
And the gentle curve of its lowly
crest;
And 1 often stop with the fear I feel —
He runs so close to the rapid wheel.
G54
WILLIS.
Whatever is rung on that noisv
bell —
Chime of the hour or funeral knell —
The dove in the belfry must hear it
well.
When the tongue swings out to the
midnight moon —
When the sexton cheerily rings for
noon —
AVhen the clock strikes clear at morn-
ing light,
When the child is waked with '• nine
at night ■' —
When the chimes jilay soft in the
Sabbath air,
Filling the spirit with tones of prayer;
Whatever tale in the bell is heard.
He broods on his folded feet unstirred.
Or, rising half in his rounded nest,
He takes the time to smooth his breast.
Then drops again with tilmed eyes.
And sleeps as the last vihration dies.
Sweet bird ! 1 would that I could be
A hermit in the crowd like thee!
AVitli wings to fly to wood and glen.
Thy lot, like mine, is cast M'ith men;
And daily, with unwilling feet,
1 tread, like thee, the crowded street;
But, unlike thee, when day is o'er,
Thou canst dismiss the world and
soar.
Or, at a half-felt wish for rest,
Canst smooth the feathers on thy
breast,
And drop, forgetful, to thy nest.
FROM '^ ABSALOM."
"Alas! my noble boy! that thou
shouidst die!
Thou, who wert made so beauti-
fully fair!
That Death should settle in thy glo-
I'ious eye,
And leave his stillness in this clus-
tering hair!
How could he mark thee for the silent
tomb ?
My proud boy, Absalom !
" Cold is thy brow, my son ! and I am
chill,
As to my bosom I have t ricd to picss
thee !
How was 1 \\ont to feel mv pulses
thrill.
Like a rich harp-string, yearning to
caress thee.
And hear thy sweet ' my father ! '
from these dumb
And cold lips, Absalom !
'■ But death is on thee. I shall hear
the gush
Of music, and the voices of the
young;
And life will pass me in the mantling
blush.
And the dark tresses to the soft
M'inds flung; —
But thou no more, with thy sweet
voice, shalt come
To meet me, Absalom !
"And oh! when I am stricken, and
my heart.
Like a bruised reed, is waiting to be
broken.
How will its love for thee, as I depart.
Yearn for thine ear to drink its last
deep token !
It were so sweet, amid death's gath-
ering gloom.
To see thee, Absalom !
"And now, farewell! 'Tis hard to
give thee up.
With death so like a gentle slum-
ber on thee ; —
And thy dark sin! — Oh! I could
drink the cup.
If from this woe its bitterness had
won thee.
May God have called thee, like a wan-
derer, home,
My lost boy, Absalom!"
FORCEYTHE WiLLSON.
THE OLD SERGEANT.
" Come a little nearer, doctor, — thank yon, — let me take the cup;
Draw your chair up, — draw it closer, — just another little sup!
May be you may think I'm better; but I'm pretty well used up, —
Doctor, you've done all you could do, but I'm just a going up!
" Feel my pulse, sir, if you want to, but it ain't much use to try '' —
" Never say that." said the surgeon, as he smothered down a sigh;
" It will never do, old comrade, for a soldier to say die! "
" What you say will make no difference, doctor, when you come to die.
'• Doctor, what has been the matter ? " " You were very faint, they say;
You must try to get to sleep now." "Doctor, have I been away ? "
" Not that anybody knows of ! " " Doctor. — Doctor, please to stay!
There is something I must tell you, and you won't have long to stay!
'■ I have got my marching orders, and I'm ready now to go;
Doctor, did you say I fainted "? — but it couldn't ha' been so. —
For as sure as I'm a sergeant, and was wounded at Shiloli.
I've this very night been back there, on the old field of Shiloh!
" This is all that I remember: The last time the lighter came.
And the lights had all been lowered, and the noises much the same.
He had not been gone five minutes before something called my name :
' Orderly Sergeant — Robert Burton ! ' — just that way it called my name.
" And I wondered who could call me so distinctly and so slow,
Knew it couldn't be the lighter. — he could not have spoken so, —
And I tried to answer, ' Here, sir! ' but I couldn't make it go;
For I couldn't move a muscle, and I couldn't make it go!
" Then I thought: It's all a nightmare, all a humbug and a bore:
Just another foolish grapevine, — and it Mon't come any more;
But it came, sir, notwithstanding, just the same way as before :
' Orderly Sergeant — Robert Burton ! ' — even plainer than before:
" That is all that I remember, till a sudden burst of light,
And I stood beside the river, where we stood that Sunday night,
Waiting to be ferried over to the dark l)luffs opposite.
When the river was perdition and all hell Mas opposite!
" And the same old palpitation came again in all its power.
And I heard a bugle sounding, as from some celestial tower;
And the same mysterious voice said: ' It is the eleventh hour!
Oi'derly Sei-geant — Robert Burton — it is the eleventh hour ! '
" Doctor Austin ! what day is this ? " " It is Wednesday night, you know."
" Yes, — to-morrow will be New Year's, and a right good time l)elow!
What time is it. Doctor Austin ? " " Nearly tM'elve." *' Then don't you go !
Can it be that all this happened — all this — not an hour ago ?
656 WILLSON.
" There was where the gunboats opened on the dark rebelHous host;
And where Webster seniicircled his last guns upon the coast ;
There were still the two log-houses, just the same, or else their ghost, —
And the same old transport came and took me over — or its ghost !
" And the old field lay before me all deserted far and wide;
There was where they fell on Prentiss, — there McClernand met the tide;
There was where stern Sherman rallied, and where Hurlljurt's heroes died, —
Lower down, where AVallace charged them, and kept charging till he died.
" There was where Lew Wallace showed them he was of the canny kin.
There was Mhere old Nelson thundered, and where liousseau waded in;
There McCook sent 'em to breakfast, and mc all began to win. —
There was where the grape-shot took me, just as we began to win.
" Now a shrond of snow and silence over everything was spread;
And but for this old blue mantle and the old hat on my head,
I should not. have even doubted, to this moment, I was dead. —
For my footsteps were as silent as the snow upon the dead !
"Death and silence! — Death and silence! all aroimd me as I sped!
And behold, a mighty tower, as if builded to the dead.
To the heaven of the heavens lifted up its mighty head.
Till the Stars and Stripes of heaven all seemed waving from its head !
" Round and mighty-based it towered, — up into the infinite, —
And I knew no mortal mason could have built a shaft so bright ;
For it shone like solid sunshine; and a winding-stair of light
Wound around it and around it till it wound clear out of sight !
" And, behold, as I approached it, with a rapt and dazzled stare, —
Thinking that I saw old comrades just ascending the great stair,
Suddenly the solemn challenge broke, of — ' Halt, and who goes there!'
' Fni a friend,' I said, ' if you are.' ' Then advance, sir, to the stair! '
"I advanced! That sentry, doctor, was Elijah Ballantyne! —
Fii'st of all to fall on Monday, after we had formed the line! —
'Welcome, my old sergeant, welcome! Welcome by that countersign!'
And he pointed to the scar there, under this old cloak of mine!
" As he grasped my hand, I shuddered, thinking only of the grave;
But he smiled and "pointed upward with a bright and bloodless glaive;
' That's the way, sir, to headquarters.' What headquarters ? • Of the brave.'
' But the great tower ? ' ' That,' he answered, ' is the way, sir, of the
brave ! '
"■ Then a sudden shame came o'er me, at his uniform of light;
At my own so old and tattered, and at his so new and bright:
' Ah ! ' said he, ' you have f oi'gotten the new imiform to-night, —
Hun-y back, for you must be here at just twelve o'clock to-night!'
" And the next thing I remember, you were sitting there, and I —
Doctor, — did you hear a footstep ? Hark ! — God bless you all ! Good-by !
Doctor, please to give my nuisket and my kna])sack, when I die.
To my son — my son that's coming, — he won't get here till 1 die !
" Tell him his old father blessed him as he never did before, —
And to carry that old musket " — Hark! a knock is at the door! —
" Till the Union " — See ! it opens ! — " Father ! Father! speak once more ! "
" Bless you! "' gasped the old, gray sergeant, and he lay and said no more!
JcHN Wilson ^Christopher North.)
THE EVENING CLOUD.
A CLOUD lay cradled near the setting
sun,
A gleam of crimson tinged its braided
snow :
Long had I watched the glory moving
on
O'er the still radiance of the lake
below.
Tranquil its spirit seemed, and floated
slow !
Even in its very motion there was
rest;
While every breath of eve that
chanced to blow
Wafted the traveller to the beauteous
\\est.
Emblem, methought, of the departed
soul.
To whose white robe the gleam of
bliss is given;
And by the breath of mercy made to
roll
Right onwards to the golden gates of
heaven,
Where to the eye of faith it peaceful
lies.
And tells to man his glorious desti-
nies.
[From the Isle of Palms.']
THE SHIPWRECK.
But list ! a low and moaning sound
At distance heard, like a spirit's song,
And now it reigns above, aromul,
As if it called the ship along.
The moon is sunk; and a clouded
Sray
Declares that her course is run,
And like a god who brings the day,
Up mounts the glorious sun.
Soon as his light has warmed the
seas,
From the parting cloud fi'esh blows
the breeze;
And that is the spirit whose well-
known song
Makes the vessel to sail in joy along.
No fears hath she ; her giant form
O'er wrathful surge, through black-
ening storm.
Majestically calm would go
'Mid the deep darkness white as
snow !
But gently now the small waves
glide
Like playful lambs o'er a mountain's
side.
So stately her bearing, so proud her
array.
The main she will traverse for ever
and aye.
^lany ports will exult at the gleam
of her mast ; —
Hush! hush! thou vain dreamer! this
hour is her last.
Five hundred souls in one instant of
dread
Are hurried o'er the deck;
And fast the miserable ship
Becomes a lifeless wreck.
Her keel hath struck on a hidden
rock.
Her' planks are torn asunder,
And down come her masts with a
reeling shock.
And a hideous crash like thunder.
Her sails are draggled in the brine.
That glatldened late the skies,
And her pennant, that kissed the fair
moonshine,
Down many a fathom lies.
Her beauteous sides, whose rainbow
hues
Gleamed softly from below,
And flung a warm and sunny flush
O'er the Avreaths of murmuring
snow,
To the coral-rock are hurrying down.
To sleep amid colors as bright as their
own.
Oh ! many a dream was in the ship
An hour before her death ;
And sights of home with sighs dis-
turbed
The sleeper's long-drawn breath.
Instead of the murmur of tlie sea,
The sailor heard the humming-tree
Alive tlirough all its leaves,
The hum of the spi-eading sycamore
That grows before Ins cottage door,
And the swallow's song in the
eaves.
His arms enclosed a blooming boy,
Who listened with tears of sorrow
and joy
To the dangers his father had
passed ;
And his wife — by turns she wept
and smiled,
As she looked on the father of her
child,
Returned to her heart at last.
He wakes at the vessel's sudden
roll
And the rush of waters is in his
soul.
Astounded, the reeling deck he paces,
'Mid hurrying forms and ghastly
faces ;
The whole ship's crew are there!
Wailing around and overhead.
Brave spirits stupefied or dead,
And madness and despair.
Now is the ocean's bosom bare,
Unbroken as the floating air;
The ship hath melted quite away.
Like a struggling dream at break of
day.
Xo image meets my wandering eye,
But the new-risen sun and the sunny
sky.
Though the night-shades are gone,
yet a vapor dull
Bedims the waves so beautiful:
While a low and melancholy moan
Mourns for the glory that hath flown.
William Winter.
THE WHITE FLAG.
Brino poppies for a weary mind
That saddens in a senseless din,
And let my spirit leave behind
A world of riot and of sin, —
In action's torpor deaf and blind.
Bring poppies — that I may forget!
Bring poppies — that I may not
leai'n!
But bid the audacious sun to set.
And bid the peaceful starlight burn
O'er biu'ied memory and regret.
Then will the slumberous grasses grow
Above the bed wherein I sleep;
While winds 1 love will softly blow,
And dews I love will softly weep.
O'er rest and silence hid beiovi%
Bring poppies, — for this work is
vain !
I cannot mould the clay of life.
A stronger hand must grasp the rein,
A stouter arm annul the strife.
A braver heart defy the pain.
Youth was my friend, — but Youth
had wings.
And he has flown unto the day.
And left me. in a night of things.
Bewildered, on a lonesome way.
And careless what the future brings.
Let there be sleep! nor any more
The noise of useless deed or word :
While the free spirit hovers o'er
A sea where not a sound is heard —
A sea of dreams, without a shore.
WINTER.
659
Dark Angel, counselling defeat,
1 see thy mournful, tender eyes:
I hear thy voice, so faint, so sweet,
And very dearly should I prize
Thy perfect peace, thy rest complete.
But is it rest to vanish hence,
To mix w ith earth, or sea, or air ?
Is death indeed a full defence
Against the tyranny of care ?
Or is it cruellest pretence ?
And, if an hour of peace draws nigh,
Shall we, who know the arts of war,
Turn from the field and basely fly.
Nor take what fate reserves us for,
Because we dream 'twere sw-eet to
die?
What shall the untried warriors do.
If we, the battered veterans, fail ?
How strive, and suffer, and be true.
In storms that make our spirits
quail.
Except our valor lead them through ?
Though for ourselves we droop and
tire,
Let us at least for them be strong.
'Tis but to bear familiar fire:
Life at the longest is not long.
And peace at last will crown desire.
So Death, T will not hear thee speak!
But I will labor — and endure
All storms of pain that time can
wreak.
IVly flag be white because 'tis )nu-e.
And not because my soul is weak !
HOMAGE.
White daisies on the meadow green
Present thy beauteous form to me :
Peaceful and joyful these are seen.
And peace and joy encompass thee.
I watch them, where they dance and
shine.
And love them — for their charm is
thine.
Red roses o'er the woodland brook
Kemember me thy lovely face :
So blushing and so fresh its look,
So wild and shy its radiant grace!
I kiss them, in their coy retreat.
And think of lips more soft and
sweet.
Gold arrows of the merry morn,
Shot swiftly over orient seas;
Gold tassels of the bending corn
That ripple in the August breeze ;
Thy wildering smile, thy glorious
hair,
And all thy power and state declare.
White, red, and gold — the awful
crown
Of beauty and of virtue too !
From what a height those eyes look
down
On him who proudly dares to sire !
Yet, free from self as God from sin,
Is love that loves, nor asks to win.
Let me but love thee in the flower,
The wavjng grass, the dancing
Avave,
The fragrant pomp of garden boAver,
The violet of the nameless grave.
Sweet dreams by night, sweet
thoughts by day, —
And time shall tire ere love decay!
Let me but love thee in the glow
When morning on the ocean shines.
Or in the mighty winds that blow.
Snow-laden, through the mountain
pines —
In all that's fair, or grand or dread,
And all shall die ere love be dead !
AFTER ALL.
The apples are ripe in the orchard.
The work of the reaper is done.
And the golden woodlands redden
In the blood of the dying sun.
At the cottage-door the grandsire
Sits, pale, in his easy-chair.
While a gentle wind of twilight
Plavs with his silver hair.
A woman is kneeling beside him;
A fair young head is prest.
In the first wilil passion of sorrow,
Against his aged breast.
And far from over the distance
The faUering echoes come.
Of tlie flying blast of trumpet
And the rattling roll of ilruni.
Then the grandsire speaks, in a whis-
per, —
' ' The end no man can see ;
But we give him to his country.
And we give our prayers to
Thee."^
The violets star the meadows.
The rosebuds fringe the door,
And over the grassy orchard
The pink-white blossoms pour.
But the grandsire' s chair is empty.
The cottage is dark and still.
There's a nameless grave in the bat-
tle-field,
And a new one under the hill.
And a pallid, tearless woman
By the cold hearth sits alone;
And the old clock in the corner
Ticks on with a steadv drone.
THE QUESTION.
Becal'sp; love's sigh is but a sigh.
Doth it the less love's heart dis-
close ?
Because the rose must fade and die.
Is it the less the lovely rose ?
Because black night must shroud the
day.
Shall the brave sun no more be gay ?
Because chill autumn frights the
birds.
Shall we distrust that spring will
come ?
Because sweet words are only words,
Shall love forevermore be ilumb ?
Because our bliss is fleeting bliss.
Shall we who love forbear to kiss ?
Because those eyes of gentle mirth
Must some time cease my heart to
thrill.
Because the sweetest voice on earth
Sooner or later must be still.
Because its idol is unsure.
Shall my strong love the less endure '?
Ah, no! let lovers breathe their
sighs.
And roses bloom, and music soimd.
And passion burst on lips and eyes.
And pleasure's merry world go
rounil :
Let golden sunshine flood the sky,
And let me love, or let me die !
WITHERED ROSES.
Not made by worth, nor marred by
flaw.
Not won by good, nor lost by ill.
Love is its own and only law.
And lives and dies by its own will.
It was our fate, and not our sin,
That we should love, and love should
win.
Not bound by oath, nor stayed by
prayer.
Nor held by thirst of strong desire.
Love lives like fragrance in the air.
And dies as breaking waves expire.
'Twas death, not falsehood, bade us
part, —
The death of love that broke my heart.
Not kind, as dreaming poets think,
Nor merciful, as sages say —
Love heeds not where its victims
sink,
"\Mien once its passion ebbs away.
'Twas nature — it was not disdain —
That made thee careless of my pain.
Not thralled by law, nor ruled by
right.
Love keeps no audit with the skies;
Its star, that once is quenched in
night.
Has set — and never more will rise.
My soul is lost, by thee forgot;
And there's no heaven w^ere thou
art not.
But happy he, though scathed and
lone,
Who sees afar love's fading wings —
Whose seared and blighted heart has
known
The splendid agony it brings!
No life that is, no life to be
("an ever take the Past from me!
lied roses bloom for other lives —
Your withered leaves alone are
mine;
Yet. not for all that Time survives
Would I your heavenly gift re-
sign —
Now cold and dead, once warm and
true.
The love that lived and died in you.
THE GOLDEN SILENCE.
What though 1 sing no other song?
What though 1 speak no other
word ?
Is silence shame ? Is patience
wrong ? —
At least one song of mine was
heard :
One echo from the mountain air.
One ocean murmur, glad and free —
One sign that nothing grand or fair,
In ail this world was lost to me.
I will not wake the sleeping lyre;
I will not strain the chords of
thought :
The sweetest fruit of all desire
Comes its own way, and comes un-
sought.
Though all the bards of earth were
dead.
And all their music passed away.
What nature wishes should be said
She'll find the rightful voice to say!
Iler heart is in the shimmering leaf.
The drifting cloud, the lonely sky,
And all we know of bliss or grief
She speaks, in forms that cannot
die.
The mountain peaks that shine afar.
The silent stars, the i)athless sea,
Are living signs of all we are,
And types of all we hope to be.
./ DUtGK.
IX Mli.MOIiV OF POE.
Cold is the paean honor sings,
And chill is glory's icy breath.
And pale the garland memory brings
To grace the iron doors of death.
Fame's echoing thunders, long and
loud.
The pomp of pride that decks the
pall.
The plaudits of the vacant crowd —
One word of love is worth them all !
With dew of grief our eyes are dim:
Ah, bid the tear of sorrow start;
And honor, in ourselves and him.
The great and tender human heart!
Through many a night of want and
woe
His frenzied spirit wandered wild.
Till kind disaster laid him low.
And love reclaimed its wayward
child.
Through many a year his fame has
grown. —
Like midnight, vast; like starlight,
sweet, —
Till now his genius fills a throne.
And homage makes his realm com-
plete.
One meed of justice, long delayed.
One crowning grace his virtues
crave !
Ah, take, thou great and injured
shade.
The love that sanctifies the grave.
And may thy spirit, hovering nigh.
Pierce the dense cloud of darkness
through.
And know, with fame that cannot
die,
Thou hast the world's compassion
too!
m'2
WITHER.
George Wither.
HYMN FOR ANNIVERSARY MAR-
RIAGE DAYS.
Lord, living here are we —
As fast united yet
As when our hands and hearts bv
Thee
Together first were knit.
And iu a thankful song
Now sing we will Thy jjraise,
For that Thou dost as well prolong
Our loving, as our days.
Together we have now
Begun another year;
But how much time Thou wilt allow
Thou makest it not appear.
AVe, therefore, do implore
That live and love we may.
Still so as if but one day more
Together we should stay.
Let each of other's wealth
Preserve a faithful care.
And of each otlier's joy and health
As if one soul we were.
Such conscience let us make,
Each other not to grieve.
As if we daily were to take
Our everlasting leave.
The frowardness that springs
From our corrupted kind.
Or from those troublous outward
things
Which may distract the mind,
Permit Thou not, O Lord,
Our constant love to shake —
Or to disturb our true accord,
Or make our hearts to ache.
But let these frailties prove
Affection's exercise;
And let discretion teach our love
Which wins the noblest prize.
So time, which wears away.
And ruins all things else.
Shall fix our love on Thee for aye,
In whom perfection dwells.
FROM "POVERTY:-'
The works my calling doth propose,
Let me not idly shun ;
For he whom idleness undoes.
Is more than twice undone;
If my estate enlarge 1 may,
Enlarge my love for Thee;
And though I more and more decay,
Yet let me thankful be.
For be we poor or be we rich,
If well employed we arc.
It neither helps nor hinders much.
Things needful to prepare;
Since God disposeth riches now.
As manna heretofore.
The feeblest gatherer got enow,
The strongest got no more.
Nor poverty nor M'ealth is that
Whereby we may acquire
That bleS'Sed and most happy state,
AVhei-eto we should aspire ;
But if Thy Spirit make me wise.
And strive to do my best.
There may be in the Morst of these
A means of being blessed.
The rich in love obtain from Thee
Thy special gifts of gi'ace ;
The poor in spirit those men be
Who shall behold Thy face:
Loi'd ! grant I may be one of these.
Thus poor, or else thus rich ;
E'en whether of the two Thou please,
I care not greatly which.
FOR A WIDOWER OR WIDOW.
How near me came the hand of
death,
AVhen at my side he struck my dear.
And took away the precious breath
AVhicli quickened my beloved peer!
How helpless am I thereby made —
By day how grieved, by night how
sad
And now my life's delight is gone,
Alas ! how am I left alone !
WITHER.
663
The voice which I did more esteem
Than music in her sweetest key,
Those eyes wliicli unto me did seem
More comfortable than the day —
Tliose now by me, as they have
been !
Sliall never more be heard or seen ;
But wliat I once enjoyed in tliem
Sliall seem hereafter as a dream.
All earthly comforts vanish thus —
So little hold of them have we
That we from them or they from ixs
May in a moment ravished be ;
Yet we are neither just nor wise
If present mercies we despise,
Or mind not how there may be made
A thankful use of what we had.
I therefore do not so bemoan,
Though these beseeming tears I drop,
The loss of my beloved one
As they that are deprived of hope;
But in expressing of my grief
My heart receiveth some relief,
And joyeth in the good I had,
Although my sweets are bitter made.
Lord, keep me faithful to the trust
Which my dear spouse reposed in me !
To him now dead preserve me just
In all that should performed be;
For though oiu- being man and wife
Extendetli only to this life,
Yet neither life nor death should end
The being of a faithful f rienil.
Those helps which I through him en-
joyed,
Let Thy continual aid supply —
That, though some hopes in him are
void,
I always may on Thee rely;
And whether I shall wed again,
Or in a single' state remain,
Unto Thine honor let it be,
And for a blessing unto me.
FOn A SERVANT.
Discourage not thyself, my soul,
Nor murnuu-, though compelled we be
To live subjected to control !
When many others may be free ;
For though the pride of some dis-
dains
Our mean and nuich despised lot.
We shall not lose our honest pains,
Xor shall our sufferance be forgot.
To be a servant is not base.
If baseness be not in the mind,
For servants make but good the place,
Whereto their Maker them assigned:
The greatest princes do no more.
And if sincerely I obey.
Though I am now despised and poor,
I shall become as great as they.
The Lord of heaven and earth was
pleased
A servant's form to undertake;
By His endurance I am eased.
And serve with gladness for His sake:
Though checked unjustly I should be.
With silence I reproofs Mill bear.
For much more injured was He
Whose deeds most worthy praises
were.
He was reviled, yet navight replied.
And I will imitate the same;
For though some faults may be de-
nied.
In part I always faulty am :
Content with meek and humble heart,
I will abide in my degree.
And act an humble servant's part.
Till God shall call me to be free.
(564
WULCOT— WOLFE.
John Wolcot (Peter Pindar).
TO MY CANDLE.
Thou lone companion of the spec-
tred night !
I wake amid thy friendly Avatchful
light.
To steal a precious hour from life-
less sleep.
Hark, the wild uproar of the winds !
and hark! [the dark,
Hell's genius roams the regions of
And swells the thundering horrors
of the deep !
From cloud to cloud the pale moon
hurrying flies,
Now blackened, and now flashing
through the skies ; [beam.
But all is silence here, beneath thy
I own 1 lal)or for the voice of praise —
For who would sink in dull obliv-
ion's stream ?
Who would not live in songs of dis-
tant days ?
How slender now, alas! thy thread
of fire !
All! falling — falling — ready to ex-
pire !
In vain thy struggles, all will soon be
o'er.
At life thou snatchest with an eager
leap;
Now round I see thy flame so feeble
creep.
Faint, lessening, quivering, glim-
mering, now no more !
Thus shall the suns of science sink
away.
And thus of beauty fade the fairest
flower —
For Where's the giant who to Time
shall say,
"Destructive tyrant, I arrest thy
power! *'
Charles Wolfe.
TO MARY.
If I had thought thou couldst have
died,
I might not weep for thee;
But I forgot, when by thy side.
That thou couldst mortal be:
It never through my mind had passed
Tlie time would e'er be o'er,
And I on thee should look my last.
And thou shouldst smile no more!
And still upon that face I look.
And think 'twill smile again;
And still the thought I wilTnot brook,
Tliat 1 must look in vain !
But when 1 speak, thou dost not say
What thou ne'er left'st unsaid;
And now I feel, as well I may,
Sweet Mary ! thou art dead !
If thou wouldst stay, e'en as thou art.
All cold and all serene —
I still might press thy silent heart,
And where thy smiles have been !
While e'en thy chill, bleak corpse I
have,
Thou seemest still mine own;
But there I lay thee in thy grave —
And I am noAV alone !
I do not think, where'er thou art.
Thou hast forgotten me ;
And I, perhaps, may soothe this
heart.
In thinking too of thee:
WOLFE.
GG5
Yet there was round thee such a dawn
Of light ne'er seen before,
As fancy never could have drawn,
And never can restore !
BURIAL OF SIR JOHN MOORE.
Not a drum was heard, not a funeral
note.
As his corse to the rampart we
hurried ;
Not a soldier discharged his farewell
shot
O'er the grave where our hero we
buried.
We buried him darkly, at dead of
night,
The sods with our bayonets turn-
ing;
By the struggling moonbeams' misty
light.
And the lantern dimly burning.
No useless coffin enclosed his breast.
Not in sheet or in shroud we wound
him;
But he lay, like a warrior taking his
rest,
With his martial cloak around him.
Few and short were the prayers we
said,
And we spoke not a word of sor-
row ;
But we steadfastly gazed on the face
of the dead.
And we bitterly thought of the
morrow.
We thought, as we hollowed his nar-
row bed.
And smoothed down his lonely pil-
low.
That the foe and the stranger would
tread o'er his liead.
And we far away on the billow !
Lightly they'll talk of the spirit that's
gone, I him;
And o'er his cold ashes upbraid
But little he'll reck, if they let him
sleep on
In the grave where a Briton has
laid him!
But half of our heavy task was done.
When the clock struck the hour
for retiring;
And we heard the distant and ran-
dom gun
That the foe was sullenly firing.
Slowly and sadly we laid him down.
From the field of his fame fresh
and gory!
We carved not a line, and we raised
not a stone.
But we left him alone with his glory.
GO. FORGET ME.
Go, forget me — why should sorrow
O'er that brow a shadow fling ?
Go, forget me — and to-morrow
Brightly smile and sweetly sing.
Smile — though I shall not be near
thee.
Sing, though I shall never hear thee ;
May thy soul with pleasure shine
Lasting as the gloom of mine.
Like the sun, thy presence glowing.
Clothes tlie meanest things in light;
And when thou, like him, art going.
Loveliest objects fade in night.
All things looked so bright aliout
thee,
That they nothing seem without
thee ;
By that pure and lucid mind
Earthly things were too, refined.
Go. thou vision, wildly gleaming.
Softly on my soul that fell;
Go, for me no longer beaming —
Hope and Beauty ! fare ye well !
Go, and all that once delighted
Take, and leave me ail benighted —
Glory's burning, genei'ous swell,
Fancy, and the poet's shell.
WOODWORTH— WORDSWORTH.
Samuel Woodworth.
THE OLD OAKEN BUCKET.
How dear to this heart are the scenes
of my childhood,
When fond recollection presents them
to view! —
The orchard, the meadow, the deep-
tangled wildwood,
And every loved spot which my in-
fancy knew!
The wide-spreading pond, and the
mill that stood hy it;
The bridge, and the rock where the
cataract fell ;
The cot of my father, the dairy-house
nigh it;
And e'en the rude bucket that hung
in the well — [bucket.
The old oaken bucket, the iron-bound
The moss-covered bucket which hung
in the well.
That moss-covered vessel I hailed as
a treasure ;
For often at noon, Avhen returned
from the field,
I foiuid it the source of an exquisite
pleasure —
The purest and sweetest that nature
can yield
How ardent I seized it, with hands
that were glowing.
And quick to the white-pebbled bot-
tom it fell !
Then soon, with the emblem of truth
overflowing,
And dripping with coolness, it rose
from the well —
The old oaken bucket, the iron-bound
bucket.
The moss-covered bucket, arose from
the well.
How sweet from the green, mossy
brim to receive it,
As, poised on the curb, it inclined to
my lips!
Not a full, blushing goblet could
tempt me to leave it.
The brightest that beauty or revelry
sips.
And now, far removed from the loved
habitation,
The tear of regret will intrusively
swell.
As fancy reverts to my father's plan-
tation.
And sighs for the bucket that hangs
in the well —
The old oaken bucket, the iron-bound
bucket.
The moss-covered bucket that hangs
in the well !
William Wordsworth.
[From Lines Compnued a Few Miles Above
Tinteni Abbey.]
THE SOLACE OF NATURE.
Though absent lon^,,
These forms of beauty have not been
to me
As is a landscape to a blind man's
eye:
But oft, in lonely rooms, and 'mid
the din
Of tOM-ns and cities, T have owed to
them.
In hours of weariness, sensations
sweet.
Felt in the blood, and felt along the
heart ;
And passing even into my purer
mind.
With tranquil restoration: feelings
too
Of unremembered pleasure; such,
perhaps.
As may have had no trivial influence
On that best portion of a good man's
life.
THE OLD
Page 666.
WORDSWORTH.
His little, nameless, unremembered
acts
Of kindness and of love. Nor less,
1 trust,
To them I may have owed another
gift,
Of aspect more sublime; that blessed
mood,
In which the burden of the mystery.
In which the heavy and the weary
weight
Of all this unintelligible world
Is lightened ; that serene and blessed
mood,
In which the affections gently lead
us on, —
Until, the breath of this corporeal
frame, •
And even the motion of our human
blood.
Almost suspended, we are laid asleep
In body, and become a living soul :
While with an eye made quiet by the
power
Of harmony, and the deep power of
joy,
We see into the life of things.
I have learned
To look on Nature, not as in the
hour
Of thoughtless youth; but hearing
oftentimes
The still, sad music of humanity.
Not harsh nor grating, thougli of
ample power
To chasten and subdue. And I have
felt
A presence that disturbs me with the
Joy
Of elevated thoughts: a sense sub-
lime
Of something far more deeply inter-
fused ,
Whose dwelling is the light of setting
suns.
And the round ocean and the living
air.
And the blue sky, and in the mind
of man:
A motion and a spirit, that impels
All thinking things, all objects of all
thought.
And rolls through all things.
[From Lines Composed a Fetv Miles Above
Tintern Abbei/.]
APOSTROPHE TO THE POET'S
SIS TEli.
Thou art with me, here, upon the
banks
Of this fair river; thou, my dearest
friend.
My dear, dear friend, and in thy
voice I catch
The language of my former heart,
and read
My former pleasures in the shooting
lights
Of thy wild eyes. Oh! yet a little
while
May I behold in thee what I was
once,
My dear, dear sister! And this
prayer I make.
Knowing that Nature never did be-
tray
The heart that loved her: 'tis her
privilege.
Through all the years of this our
life, to lead
From joy to joy : for she can so in-
form
The mind that is within us, so im-
press
With quietness and beauty, and so
feed
With lofty thoughts, that neither evil
tongues.
Rash judgments, nor the sneers of
seltish men.
Nor greetings where no kindness is,
nor all
The dreary intercourse of daily life,
Shall e'er prevail against us, or dis-
turb
Our cheerful faith that all which we
behold
Is full of blessings. Therefore let
the moon
Shine on thee in thy solitaiy walk:
And let the misty mountain winds be
fi'ee
To blow against thee: and, in after
years.
When these wild ecstasies shall be
matured
Into a sober pleashre, when thy mind
668
WORDSWORTH.
Sliall be a mansion for all lovely
forms,
Thy memory be as a dwelling-place
For all sweet sounds and harmonies;
oh, then.
If solitude, or fear, or pain, or grief,
Should be thy portion, with what
healing thoughts
Of tender joy wilt thou remember
me,
And these my exhortations! nor,
perchance,
If I should be v/liere I no more can
hear
Thy voice, nor catch from thy wild
eyes these gleams
Of past existence, wilt thou then
forget
That on the banks of this delightful
stream
We stood together; and that I, so
long
A worshipper of Nature, hither came.
Unwearied in that service : rather say
With warmer love; oh, with far
deeper zeal
Of holier love. Nor wilt thou then
forget,
That after many wandeiings, many
years
Of absence, these steep woods and
lofty cliffs,
And this green pastoral landscape,
were to me
More dear, both for themselves and
for thy sake.
[Frnni The Excursion.]
THE PROP OF FAITH.
One adequate support
For the calamities of mortal life
Exists — one only — an assured belief
That the procession of our fate,
however
Sad or disturbed, is ordered by a
Being
Of infinite Ijenevolence and power,
Whose everlasting purposes embrace
All accidents, converting them to
good.
The darts of anguish fix not where
the seat •
Of suffering hath been thoroughly
fortified
By acquiescence in the Will supreme,
For time and for eternity — by faith,
Faith absolute in God, including
hope.
And the defence that lies in Ijound-
less love
Of His perfections; with habitual
dread
Of aught unworthily conceived, en-
dured
Impatiently, ill-done, or left undone
To the dishonor of His holy name.
Soul of our souls, and safeguard of
the world,
Sustain, Thou only canst, the sick of
heart ! .
Restore Iheir languid spirits, and re-
call
Their lost affections unto Thee and
Thine!
[From The Excursion.]
UNDEVELOPED GEKIUS.
Oh, many are the poets that are
sown
By Nature! men endowed with high-
est gifts —
The vision, and the faculty divine —
Yet wanting the accomplishment of
verse
(Which in the docile season of their
youth
It was denied them to acquire,
through lack
Of culture and the inspiring aid of
books ;
Or haply by a temper too severe;
Or a nice backwardness afraid of
shame).
Nor, having e'er as life advanced,
been led
By circumstance to take unto the
height
The measure of themselves, these
favored beings.
All but a scattered few, live out their
time.
Husbanding that which they possess
within.
WORDSWORTH.
669
And go to the grave unthought of.
Strongest minds
Are often those of whom the noisy
world hears least.
IFrom The Excursion.]
THE DEAF DALESMAN.
Almost at the root
Of that tall pine, the shadow of
whose bare
And slender stem, while here I sit at
eve,
Oft stretches towards me, like a long
straight path
Traced faintly in the greensward;
there beneath
A plain blue stone, a gentle dalesman
lies,
Fi'om whom, in early childhood, was
withdrawn
The precious gift of hearing. He
grew up
From year to year in loneliness of
soul ;
And this deep mountain valley was
to him
Somidless, with all its streams. The
binl of dawn
Did never rouse tliis cottager from
sleep
With startling summons; nor for his
delight
The vernal cuckoo shouted; not for
him
Murmured the laboring bee. When
stormy winds
Were working the broad bosom of
the lake
Into a thousand thousand sparkling
waves,
Hocking the trees, or driving cloud
on cloud
Along the sharp edge of yon lofty
crags,
The agitated scene before his eye
Was silent as a jiicture : evermore
Were all things silent, wheresoe'er
he moved ;
Yet, by the solace of his own pnre
tlioughts
Upheld, he duteously pursued the
round
Of rural labors; the steep mountain-
side
Ascended, with liis staff and faithful
dog;
The plough he guided, and the scythe
he swayed;
And the ripe corn before his sickle
fell
Among the jocund reapers. For
himself.
All watchful and industrious as he
was.
He wrought not; neither flock nor
field he owned ;
Xo wish for wealth had place within
his mind;
Nor husband's love, nor father's hope
or care.
Though born a younger brotlier, need
was none
That from the floor of his paternal
home
He should depart to plant himself
anew ;
And when, mature in manhood, lie
beheld
His parents laid in earth, no loss en-
sued
Of rights to him; but he remained
well pleased.
By tlie pure bond of independent
love,
An inmate of a second family.
Tlie fellow-laborer and friend of him
To whom the small inheritance had
fallen.
Nor deem tliat his mild presence was
a weight
That pressed upon his brother's
house, for books
Were ready comrades whom he could
not tire.
Of whose society the blameless man
Was never satiate. Their familiar
voice.
Even to old age, with unabated
charm
Beguiled his leisure hours, refreslied
his thoughts;
Beyond its natural elevation, raised
His introverted spirit, and bestowed
Upon his life an outward dignity
Which all acknowledged. The dark
winter night.
The stormy day, had each its own
resource ;
Song of tlie muses, sage historic tale,
Science severe, or word of Holy Writ
Announcing immortality and joy
To the assembled spirits of the just,
From imperfection and decay secure.
Thus sootlied at home, thus busy in
the field.
To no perverse suspicion he gave
way,
No languor, peevishness, nor vain
complaint :
And they, who were about him, did
not fail
In reverence, or in courtesy; they
prized
His gentle manners; and his peaceful
smiles.
The gleams of his slow-varying coun-
tenance.
Were met with answering sym^jathy
and love.
At length, when sixty years and
five were told,
A slow disease insensibly consumed
The powers of nature; and a few
short steps
Of friends and kindred bore him
from his home
(Yon cottage shaded by the woody
crags)
To the profounder stillness of the
grave.
Nor was his funeral denied the grace
Of many tears, virtuous and thought-
ful grief ;
Heart-sorrow rendered sweet by grat-
itude.
And now that monumental stone pre-
serves
His name, and unambitiously relates
How long, and by what kindly out-
Mard aids,
And in what pure contentedness of
mind.
The sad privation was by him en-
dured.
And yon tall i^ine-tree, whose com-
posing sound
Was wasted on the good man's living
ear.
Hath now its own peculiar sanctity;
And, at the touch of every wander-
ing breeze,
Mvu'murs, not idly, o'er his peaceful
erave.
FROM "IXTIMATIOyS OF IMMOR-
TALITY."
Our birth is but a sleep and a forget-
ting :
The soul that rises with us, our life's
star,
Hatli had elsewhere its setting,
And Cometh from afar;
Not in entire forgetfulness,
And not in utter nakedness.
But trailing clouds of glory do we
come
From God, who is our home:
Heaven lies about us in our infancy!
Shades of the prison-house begin to
close
Upon the growing boy.
But he beholds the light, and M'hence
it Hows,
He sees it in his joy;
The youth, who daily farther from
the east
Must travel, still is Nature's priesl,
And by the vision splendid
Is on his way attended;
At length the man perceives it die
away,
And fade into the light of common
day.
O joy ! that in our embers
Is something that doth live,
That Nature yet remembers
What was so fugitive!
The thought of our past years in me
doth breed
Perpetual benedictions: not indeed
For that which is most Avorthy to be
blessed ;
Delight and libeity, the simple creed
Of childhood, whether busy or at
rest.
With new-fledged hope still fluttering
in his l)reast :
Not for these I raise
The song of thanks and praise;
WORD SWOB TE.
071
But for those obstinate question-
ings
Of sense and outward things,
FalUngs from us, vanishings;
Black misgivings of a creature
Moving about in worlds not realized,
High instincts, before which our
mortal natiue
Did tremble like a guilty thing sur-
prised !
But for those first affections.
Those sliadowy recollections,
Wliich, be they wliat they may.
Are yet the fountain liglit of all our
day,
Are yet a master light of all our
seeing;
Uphold us — cherisli — and have
power to make
Our noisy years seem moments in the
being
Of the eternal silence: truths that
wake.
To perish never;
Which neither listlessness, nor mad
endeavor,
Xor man nor boy,
Nor all that is at enmity with joy,
Can utterly abolish or destroy!
Hence, in a season of calm weather,
Thougli inland far we be.
Our souls have siglit of that immor-
tal sea
Wliicli brought us hither;
Can in a moment travel thither.
And see the children sport upon the
sliore.
And hear the inighty waters rolling
evermore.
TO A YOUXG LADY,
WHO HAD BEEN REPROACHED FOR TAKING LONG
WALKS IN THE COUNTRY.
Dp:ar child of nature, let them
rail !
— There is a nest in a green dale,
A harbor and a hold.
Where thou, a wife and friend, shalt
see
Tliy own delightful days, and be
A light to voung and old.
There, healthy as a shepherd-boy.
As if thy lieritage were joy.
And pleasure were thy trade.
Thou, M'hile thy babes around thee
cling,
Shalt show us how divine a thing
A woman may be made.
Thy thoughts and feelings shall not
die,
Nor leave thee when gray hairs are
nigh,
A melancholy slave;
But an old age serene and bright,
And lovely as a Lapland night,
.Shall lead thee to thy grave.
I'HE DAFFODILS.
I WANDERED louely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and
hills,
Wlien all at once I saw a crowd,
A host of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees.
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.
Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the Milky Way,
Tliey stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance.
Tossing their heads in sprightly
dance.
The waves beside them danced, but
they
Outdid the sparkling waves in glee:
A poet could not but be gay,
In such a jocund company :
I gazed and gazed, but little thought
What wealth the show to me had
brought.
For oft when on my couch I lie.
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude.
And then my heart with pleasure
fills,
And dances with the daffodils.
672
WORDSWORTH.
TWILIGHT.
IlAii,, Twilight, sovereign of one
peaceful hour!
Not dull art thou as undiscerning
Night;
But studious only to remove from
sight
Day's mutable distinctions. Ancient
power!
Thus did the waters gleam, the
mountains lower
To the rude Briton, when, in wolf-
skin vest
Here roving wild, he laid him down
to rest
On the bare rock, or through a leafy
bower
Looked ere his eyes were closed. By
him was seen
The selfsame vision which we now
behold.
At thy meek bidding, shadowy i^ow-
er, brought forth ;
These mighty barriers, and the gulf
between ;
The floods, — the stars; a spectacle
as old
As the beginning of the heavens and
earth !
TO SLEEP.
A FLOCK of sheep that leisurely pass
by,
One after one; the sound of rain,
and bees
Murmuring; the fall of rivers, Minds,
and seas.
Smooth fields, white sheets of water,
and pure sky;
I've thought of all by turns; and still
I lie
Sleepless: and soon the small bird's
melodies
Must hear, first utter'd from my or-
chard trees;
And the first cuckoo's melancholy
cry.
Even thus last night, and two nights
more, I lay,
And could not Avin thee, Sleep! by
any stealth:
So do not let me wear to-night away :
AVithout thee what is all the mor-
ning's wealth?
Come, blessed barrier betwixt day
and day.
Dear motlier of fresh thoughts and
joyous health !
Lucr.
She dwelt among the untrodden ways
Beside the springs of Dove;
A maid whom there were none to
praise.
And very few to love.
A violet by a mossy stone
Half-hidden from the eye !
— Fair as a star, when only one
Is shining in the sky.
She lived unknown, and few could
know
When Lucy ceased to be ;
But she is in her grave, and oh!
The difference to me!
TO A DISTANT FIUFXD.
Why art thovi silent ! Is thy love a
plant
Of such weak fibre that the treacher-
ous air
Of absence withers what was once so
fair ?
Is there no debt to pay, no boon to
grant ?
Yet have my thoughts for thee been
vigilant.
Bound to thy service with unceasing
care —
The mind's least generous wish a
mendicant
For nought but what thy happiness
could spare.
Speak! — though this soft warm
heart, once free to hold
A thousand tender pleasures, thine
and mine.
Be left more desolate, more dreary
cold
WORDSWORTH.
673
Than a forsaken bird's-nest fiU'd with
snow
'Mid its own bvish of leafless eglan-
tine —
Speak, that my torturing doubts their
end may know !
TO A SKYLARK.
Ethereal minstrel! pilgrim of the
sky!
Dost thou despise the earth where
cares aboimd ?
Or while the wings aspire, are heart
and eye
Both with thy nest upon the de\v"y
ground ?
Thy nest which thou canst drop into
at will.
Those quivering wings composed,
that music still !
To the last i^oint of vision, and be-
yond.
Mount, daring warbler ! — that love-
prompted strain
— 'Twixt thee and thine a never-fail-
ing bond —
Thrills not the less the bosom of the
plain :
Yet might' St thou seem, proud privi-
lege! to sing
All independent of the leafy spring.
Leave to the nightingale her shady
wood ;
A privacy of glorious light is thine.
Whence thou dost pour upon tlie
world a flood
Of harmony, with instinct more di-
vine;
Type of the wise, who soar, but never
roam —
True to the kindred points of Heaven
and Home!
WE ARE SEVEN.
A SIMPLE child
That lightly draws its breath.
And feels its life in eveiy lijub,
What should it know of death ?
I met a little cottage girl :
She was eight years old, she said ;
Her hair was tliick with many a curl
That cluster'd round her head.
She had a rustic, Avoodland air,
And she was wildly clad ;
Her eyes were fair, and very fair;
— Her beauty made me glad.
"Sisters and brothers, little maid,
How many may you be ? "
'"How many? Seven in all," she
said.
And Avondering look'd at me.
"And where are they? I prav you
tell."
She answer' d, " Seven are we;
And two of us at Conway dwell.
And two are gone to sea.
Two of us in the churchyard lie.
My sister and my brother;
And, in tlie cluu'chyai-d cottage, 1
Dwell near them with my mother."
" You say that two at (Jonway dwell,
And two are gone to sea.
Yet ye are seven ! — I pray you tell,
Sweet maid, how this may be ?"
Then did the little maid reply,
" Seven boys and girls are we;
Two of us in the churchyard lie.
Beneath the churchyard tree."
"You run about, my little maid.
Your limbs they are alive;
If two are in the churchyard laid,
Then ye are only five."
" Their graves are green, they may
be seen,"
The little maid replied,
" Twelve steps or more from my
mother's door.
And they are side by side.
My stockings there I often knit.
My kerchief there I hem;
And there upon the ground I sit —
I sit and sing to them,
674
WORDSWORTH.
And often after sunset, sir,
When it is light and fair,
I take my Httle porringer,
And eat my supper there.
The first that died was little Jane;
In bed she moaning lay,
Till God released her of her pain;
And then she went away.
So in the churchyard she was laid ;
And all the sunnner diy,
Together round her grave we play'd,
My brother Jolin and 1.
And when the ground was white with
snow.
And I could run and slide.
My brother John was forced to go,
And he lies by her side.
" How many are you then," said I,
" If they two are in heaven ? "
The little maiden did reply,
' ' O master ! we are seven !
"But they are dead; those two are
dead !
Their spirits are in Heaven!"
'Twas throwing words aw^ay: for still
The little maid would have her will,
And said," Nay, we are seven! "
And steps of virgin liberty;
A countenance in which did meet
Sweet records, promises as sweet;
A creatiu'e not too bright or good
For human nature's daily food,
For transient sorrows, simple wiles,
Praise, l^lame, love, kisses, tears, and
smiles.
And now I see with eye serene
The very pulse of the machine;
A being breathing thoughtful breath,
A traveller betwixt life and death ;
The reason firm, the temperate
will.
Endurance, foresight, strength, and
skill;
A perfect woman, nobly planned,
To warn, to comfort, and command ;
And yet a spirit still, and bright
With something of an angel Ught.
SHE IFAS A I'HANTOM OF DE-
LIGHT.
She was a i:)hantom of delight
AVhen tirst she gleamed upon my
sight;
A lovely apparition, sent
To be a mojnent's ornament;
Her eyes as stars of twilight fair,
Like twilight's, too, her dusky hair;
But all things else about her drawn
From May-time and the cheerful
dawn ;
A dancing shape, an image gay.
To haunt, to startle, and waylay,
I saw her upon nearer view,
A spirit, yet a woman too!
Her household motions light
free,
and
THY ART BE NATUIiE.
A poet! — He hath put his heart to
school.
Nor dares to move unpropped upon
the staff
Which art hath lodged within his
hand; must laugh
By precept only, and shed tears by
rule !
Thy art be nature; the live current
quaff.
And let the groveller sip his stagnant
pool.
In fear that else, wdien critics grave
and cool
Have killed him, scorn should write
his epitaph.
How does the meadow-flowei- its
bloom unfold!
Because the lovely little flower is
free
Down to its root, and in this free-
dom bold ;
And so the grandeur of the forest-
tree
Comes not by casting in a formal
mould,
But from its own divine yitality.
SCOBN NOT THE SONNET.
Scorn not the sonnet. Critic, you
have frowned,
Mindless of its just honors: with this
key
Shakespeare unlocked his heart; the
melody
Of this small lute gave ease to Pe-
trarch's wound;
A thousand times this pipe did Tasso
sound ; [grief ;
Camoens soothed with it an exile's
The sonnet glittered a gay myrtle leaf
Amid the cypress with which Dante
crowned
His visionary brow; a glow-worm
lamp,
It cheered mild Spenser, called from
fairy-land
To struggle through dark ways ; and,
when a damp [hand
Fell round the path of Milton, in his
The thing became a trumpet, whence
he blew
Soul-animating strains — alas, too
few!
EVENING.
It is a beauteous evening, calm and
free.
The holy time is quiet as a nun
Breathless with adoration ; the broad
smi
Is sinking down in its tranquillity;
The gentleness of heaven is on the
sea.
Listen ! the mighty Being is awake,
And doth witli liis eternal motion
make
A sound like thunder — everlastingly.
Dear child! dear girl, that walkest
with me here!
If thou appearest untouched by sol-
emn thought.
Thy nature is not, therefore, less
divine :
Thou liest in Abraham's bosom all
the year,
And worshippest at the temple's in-
ner shrine,
God being Mith thee when we knew
it not.
THE WORLD IS TOO MUCH WITH US.
The world is too much with us ; late
and soon.
Getting and spending, we lay waste
our powers :
Little we see in Nature that is ours ;
We have given our hearts away, a
sordid boon!
This sea that bares her bosom to the
moon ;
The winds that will be howling at all
hovu's
And are up-gathered now like sleep-
ing flowers ;
For this, for everything, we are out
of tune;
It moves us not. Great God! I'd
rather be
A pagan suckled in a creed outworn;
So might I, standing on this pleasant
lea,
Have glimpses that would make me
less forlorn
Have sight of Proteus coming from
the sea, [horn.
Or hear old Triton blow his wreathed
WESTMINSTER BUIDGE.
Earth has not anything to show
more fair :
Dull would he be of soul who could
pass by
A sight so touching in its majesty:
This city now doth like a garment
wear [bare,
The beauty of the morning; silent,
Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and
temples lie
Open luito the fields and to the sky,
All bright and glittering in the
smokeless air.
Never did sun more beautifully steep
In his first splendor valley, rock, or
hill;
Ne'er saw I, never felt, a calm so
deep !
The river glideth at his own sweet
will:'
Dear God! the very houses seem
asleep ;
And all that mighty heart is lying
still!
676
WOTTON.
TO THE CUCKOO.
BLITHE new-comer! I have heard,
1 hear thee and rejoice:
cuckoo ! shall I call thee bird,
Or but a wandering voice '?
While I am lying on the grass,
Thy loud note smites my ear!
From hill to hill it seems to pass,
At once far off and near!
1 hear thee babbling to the vale
Of sunshine and of flowers;
And unto me thou bringest a tale
Of visionary hours.
Thrice welcome, darling of the
spring
Even yet thou art to me
No bird, but an invisible thing,
A voice, a mystery.
The same whom in my school-boy
days
I listened to; that cry
Which made me look a thousand
ways
In bush and tree and sky.
To seek thee did I often rove
Thi'ough woods and on the green;
And thou wert still a hope, a love;
Still longed for, never seen !
And I can listen to thee yet;
Can lie upon the plain
And listen, till I do beget
That golden time again.
O blessed bird ! the earth we pace
Again appears to be
An unsubstantial, fairy place;
That is fit home for thee !
Sir Henry Wotton.
A HAPPY LIFE.
How happy is he born and taught
That serveth not another's will;
Whose armor is his honest thought
And simple truth his utmost skill !
Whose passions not his masters are.
Whose soul is still prepared for death,
Not tied unto the world with care
Of public fame, or private breath ;
Who envies none that chance doth
raise
Or vice ; who never understood
How deepest wounds are given by
praise;
Nor rules of state, but rules of good :
Who hath his life from rumors freed,
Whose conscience is his strong re-
treat :
Whose state can neither flatterers
feed.
Nor ruin make accusers great;
Who God doth late and early pray
More of his grace than gifts to lend ;
And entertains the harmless day
With a well-chosen book or friend :
— This man is freed from servile
bands
Of hope to rise, or fear to fall ;
Lord of himself, though not of lands;
And having nothing, yet hath all.
WYATT— YOUNG.
677
Sir Thomas Wyatt.
DESCRIPTION OF THE ONE HE
WOULn LOIE.
A FACE that should content me
wondrous well,
Should not be fair, but lovely to
behold ;
With gladsome cheer, all grief for to
expel ;
With sober looks so would I that
it should
Speak without words, such words as
none can tell;
The tress also should be of crisped
gold.
With wit, and these, might chance I
might be tied.
And knit again the knot that should
not slide.
A LOVEIVS PRAYER.
Disdain me not without desert,
Nor leave me not so suddenly;
Since well ye wot that in my heart
I mean ye not but honestly.
Refuse me not without cause why,
Xor think me not to he unjust;
Since that l)y lot of fantasy.
This careful knot needs knit
must.
Mistrust me not, though some there be
That fain would spot my steadfast-
ness.
Believe them not, since that ye see
The proof is not as they express.
Forsake me not, till I deserve ;
Nor hate me not, till I offend,
Destroy me not, till that I swerve;
But since ye know what I intend.
Disdain me not, that am your own ;
Eef use me not that am so true ;
Mistrust me not, till all be known ;
Forsake me not now for no new.
PLEASURE MIXED WITH PAIN.
Venomous thorns that are so sharp
and keen
Bear flowers we see, full fresh and
fair of hue :
Poison is also put in medicine.
And unto man his health doth oft
renew.
The fire that all. things eke consu-
meth clean.
May hurt and heal: then if that
this be true,
I trust some time my harm may be
my health.
Since every woe is joined with some
wealth.
Edward Young.
[From Night Thoughts.']
PROCRASTINATION. AND FORGET-
FULNESS OF DEATH.
All promise is poor dilatory man.
And that through every stage: Avhen
young, indeed.
In full content we sometimes nobly
rest.
Unanxious for ourselves; and only
wish.
As duteous sons, our fathers were
more wise.
At thirty man suspects himself a
fool;
Knows it at forty, and i-eforms liis
plan ;
At fifty, chides his infamous delay,
Pushes his prudent purpose to re-
solve ;
078
YOUNG.
In all the magnanimity of tliought
liesolves, and re-resolves; then dies
the same.
And why ? Because he thinks him-
self immortal.
All men think all men mortal, but
themselves ;
Themselves, when some alarming
shock of fate
Strikes through their wounded hearts
the sudden dread :
But their hearts wounded, like the
wounded air,
Soon close ; where passed the shaft,
no trace is found.
As from the wing no scar the sky
retains;
The parted wave no furrow from the
keel;
So dies in human hearts the thought
of death.
[From Xhjht Thour/kts.]
>'IGHT II.
TIME, ITS USE AND MISUSE.
Time, in advance, behind him hides
his wings.
And seems to creep, decrepit with
his age :
Behold him, when past by; what
then is seen.
But his broad pinions swifter than
the winds ?
We waste, not use, our time: we
breathe, not live.
Time wasted is existence, used is
life :
We push time from us, and we wish
him back;
Lavish of lustrums, and yet fond of
life;
Life we think long, and short; death
seek, antl sliun ;
Body and soul, like peevish man and
wife.
United jar, and yet are loth to part.
Oh, the dark days of vanity! while
here.
How tasteless! and how terrible,
when gone !
Gone? they ne'er go; when past,
they iiaunt us still :
The spirit walks of every day de-
ceased ;
And smiles an angel, or a fury
frowns.
Nor death, nor life, delight us. If
time past.
And time possessed, both pain us,
what can please ?
That which the Deity to please or-
dained.
Time used. The man who conse-
crates his hours
By vigorous effort, and an honest
aim,
At once he draws the sting of life
and death :
He walks with nature ; and her paths
are iieace.
[From Night Thoiifjhts.]
NIGHT II.
JOr TO BE SHAH EI).
Nature, in zeal for human amity,
Denies, or damps, an undivided joy.
Joy is an import; joy is an exchange;
•Joy flies monopolists : it calls for two;
Kich fruit! Heaven-planted! never
plucked by one.
Needful auxiliars are our friends, to
give
To social man true relish of himself.
Full on oiuselves, descending in a
line,
Pleasure's bright beam is feeble in
delight :
Delight intense is taken by rebound ;
Keverberated pleasures fire the breast.
[From Xujht TItouyhts.]
NIGHT II.
CONSCIENCE.
O TREACHEROUS conscience! while
she seems to sleep
On rose and myrtle, lulled with sy-
ren song;
While she seems nodding o'er her
charge, to drop
On headlong appetite the slackened
rein.
YOUNG.
679
And give us vqy to license, unrecalled,
Unmarked; see, from behind lier
secret stand,
The sly informer minutes every fault,
And her dread diary with horror fills.
Not the gross act alone employs her
pen:
She reconnoitres fancy's airy band,
A watchful foe! the formidable spy,
Listening, o'erhears the whispers of
our camp ;
Our dawning purposes of heart ex-
plores,
And steals our embryos of iniquity.
As all-rapacious usurers conceal
Their doomsday-book from all-con-
suming heirs;
Thus, with indulgence most severe,
she treats
Us spendthrifts of inestimable time ;
Unnoted, notes each moment misap-
l^lied ;
In leaves more durable than leaves
of brass.
Writes our whole history.
[From Night Thoughts.]
NIGHT II.
EFFECT OF CO XT ACT WITH THE
WORLD.
YiRxrE, for ever frail, as fair, below.
Her tender nature suffers in the
crowd,
Nor touches on the world, without a
stain :
The world's infectious; few bring
back at eve.
Immaculate, the manners of the
morn.
Something we thought, is blotted;
we resolved.
Is shaken; we renounced, returns
again.
Each salutation may slide in a sin
Unthought before, or fix a former
flaw.
Nor is it strange: light, motion, con-
course, noise.
All, scatter us abroad. Thought, out-
ward-bound.
Neglectful of her home affairs, flies
off
In fume and dissipation, quits her
charge,
And leaves the breast unguarded to
the foe.
Present example gets within our
guard.
And acts with double force, by few
repelled.
Ambition tires ambition; love of gain
Strikes, like a pestilence, from breast
to breast:
Riot, pride, perfidy, blue vapors
breathe ;
And inhumanity is caught from man,
From smiling man. A slight, a sin-
gle glance.
And shot at random, often has
brought home
A sudden fever to the throbbing
heart,
Of envy, rancor, or impure desire.
We see, we hear, Avith peril; safety
dwells
Remote from multitude; the world's
a school
Of wrong, and what proficients
swarm around
AVe must, or imitate, or disapprove ;
Must list as their accomplices, or
foes.
{From Night Thoughts.']
NIGHT II.
THE CROWNING DISAPPOINT-
MENT.
So prone our hearts to whisper what
we wish,
'Tis later with the wise than he's
aware.
And all mankind mistake their time
of day;
Even age itself. Fresh hopes are
hourly sown
In furrowed brows. To gentle life's
descent
We shut our eyes, and think it is a
plain.
We take fair days in winter, for the
spring;
G80
YOUNG.
And turn oiu' blessings into bane.
Since oft
Man must compute tliat age he can-
not feel,
He scarce believes he's older for his
jears. [store
Thus, at life's latest eve, we keep in
One disappointment sure, to crown
tlie rest;
The disappointment of a promised
hour.
[From Night Thouqhts.]
NIGHT 11.
INSUFFICIENCY OF THE WORLD.
'Tis greatly wise to talk with our
past hours;
And ask them, what report they bore
to heaven ;
And how they might have borne
more welcome news.
Their answers form M'hat men expe-
rience call ;
If wisdom's friend, her best; if not,
worst foe.
Oh, reconcile them! Kind experi-
ence cries,
"There's nothing here, but what as
nothing weighs :
The more our joy, the more we know
it vain ;
And by success are tutored to de-
spair."
Nor is it only thus, but must be so.
Who knows not this, though gray, is
still a child ;
Loose then from earth the grasp of
fond desire.
Weigh anchor, and some happier
clime explore.
[From Ntfiht Tliourihts.']
XICIIT II.
EFFORT, THE (i.iUGE OF GREAT-
NESS.
No blank, no trifle, nature made, or
meant.
Virtue, or purposed virtue, still be
thine :
This cancels thy complaint at once;
this leaves
In act no trifle, and no blank in
time.
This greatens, tills, immortalizes, all ;
This, the blest art of turning all to
gold ;
This, the good heart's prerogative,
to raise
A royal tribute from the poorest
hours :
Immense revenue! every moment
pays.
If nothing more than purpose in thy
power ;
Thy purpose firm is equal to the
deed :
Who does the best his circumstance
allows.
Does well, acts nobly; angels could
no more.
Our outward act, indeed, admits re-
straint;
'Tis not in things o'er thought to
domineer.
Guard well thy thought ; our thoughts
are heard in Heaven.
[From Night Thoui/hts.]
NIGHT 11.
THE END OF THE VIRTUOUS.
The chamber where the good man
meets his fate.
Is privileged beyond the common
walk
Of virtuous life, quite in the vei'ge
of heaven.
A death-bed's a detector of the heart.
Here, tired dissimulation drops her
mask ;
Through life's grimace, that mistress
of the scene !
Here, real and apparent are the same.
You see the man; you see his hold
on heaven.
Whatever farce the boastful hero
plays.
Virtue alone has majesty in death;
And greater still, the more the tyrant
frowns.
YOUNG.
681
\_From Night Thoughts.]
NIGHT III.
THE OTHER LIFE THE EXD OF
THIS.
'• He sins against this life wlio sliglits
the next."
Wliat is tliis life ? How few their
favor! te know !
Fond in the dark, and hlind in our
embrace,
By passionately loving life we make
Loved life unlovely; hugging her to
death.
We give to time eternity's regard;
And, dreaming, take our passage for
our port.
Life has no value as an end, but
means ;
An end, deplorable ! a means, divine !
AVIien 'tis our all, 'tis nothing; worse
than nought;
A nest of pains ; when held as noth-
ing, much:
Like some fair humorists, life is
most enjoyed
When courted least; most worth,
when disesteemed :
Then "tis the seat of comfort, rich
in peace;
In prospect, richer far; important!
awful !
Xot to be mentioned, but with shouts
of praise;
Not to be thought on, but with tides
of .ioy;
The mighty basis of eternal bliss !
[From Night Thoughts.]
NIGHT III.
THE GLORY OF DEATH.
Death but entombs the body; life
the soul.
Death has no dread, but what frail
life imparts;
Xor life true joy, but what kind
death improves.
Death, that absolves my birth; a
curse without it I
Eich death, that realizes all my cares,
Toils, virtues, hopes; without it a
chimera! [joy-"
Death, of all i>ain the period, not of
Joy's source, and subject, still sub-
sist unhurt,
One, in my soul: and one, in her
great Sire.
Death is the crown of life;
Were death denied, poor man would
live in vaiii ;
Were death denied, to live would not
be life ;
Were death denied, even fools Avould
wish to die.
Death wounds to cure: Ave fall; we
rise ; we reign ;
Spring from our fetters, fasten in the
skies; [sight:
Where blooming Eden withers inour
Death gives us more than was in
Eden lost.
This king of terrors is the prince of
peace.
When shall I die to vanity, pain,
death ?
When shall I die ? When shall I live
for ever '?
IFrom Xight Thoughts.]
NIGHT III.
CRUELTY.
Man is to man the sorest, surest ill,
A previous blast foretells the rising
storm ;
O'erwhelming turrets threaten ere
they fall;
Volcanoes belloAV ere they disem-
bogue ;
Earth trembles ere her yawning jaws
devour;
And smoke betrays the wide-consum-
ing fire :
Ruin from man is most concealed
when near, [blow.
And sends the dreadful tidings in the
Is this the flight of fancy ? Would
it were!
Heaven's Sovereign saves all beings,
but himself,
That hideous sight, a naked human
heart.
YOUNG.
[From Night Thoughts.]
NIGHT JV.
FALSE TEIilWRS IN VIEW OF
DEATH.
Why start at death ! Where is he ?
Death arrived,
Is past; not come, or gone, he's
never here.
Ere hope, sensation fails; blaclc-
boding man
Eeceives, not suffers, death's tremen-
dous blow.
The knell, the shroud, the mattock,
and the grave;
The deep, damp vault, the darkness,
and the worm ; [eve,
These are the bugbears of a winter's
The terrors of the living, not the
de'ad.
Imagination's fool and error's wretch,
Man makes a death, which nature
never made:
Then on the point of his own fancy
falls;
And feels a thousantl deaths, in fear-
ing one.
[From Night Thoughts.']
NIGHT V.
DIFFERENT SOURCES OF FUNE-
RAL TEARS.
OuK funeral tears from different
causes rise.
As if from cisterns in the soul.
Of various kinds they flow. From
tender hearts
By soft contagion called, some burst
at once.
And stream obsequious to the lead-
ing eye.
Some ask more time, by curious art
distilled.
Some hearts, in secret hard, unapt to
melt.
Struck by the magic of the public eye.
Like Moses' smitten rock, gush out
amain.
Some weep to share the fame of the
deceased.
So high in merit, and to them so
dear:
They dwell on praises, which they
think they share;
And thus, without a blush, commend
themselves.
Some mourn, in proof that some-
thing they could love:
They weep not to relieve their grief,
but show.
Some weep in perfect justice to the
dead.
As conscious all their love is in arrear.
Some mischievously weep, not unap-
prised.
Tears, sometimes, aid the conquest
of an eye.
With what address the soft Ephesians
draw
Their sable network o'er entangled
hearts !
As seen through crystal, how their
roses glow.
While liquid pearl runs trickling
down their cheek !
()f hers not j)rouder Egypt's wanton
queen,
Carousing gems, herself dissolved in
love.
Some weep at death, abstracted from
the dead.
And celebrate, like Charles, their
own decease.
By kind construction some are
deemed to weep
Because a decent veil conceals their
joy.
Some weep in earnest, and yet weep
in vain.
As deep in indiscretion as in woe.
Passion, blind passion! impotently
pours
Tears, that deserve more tears ; while
Reason sleeps.
Or gazes like an idiot, unconcerned;
Nor comprehends the meaning of the
storm ;
Knows not it speaks to her, and her
alone.
Half-round the globe, the tears
pumped up by death
Are spent in watering vanities of life;
In making folly tiomish still more
fair.
YOUNG.
683
[From Night Though fs.]
XIGHT V.
VIRTUE, THE MEASURE OF
YEARS.
What though short thy date!
Virtue, not rolHng suns, the mind
matures.
That life is long, which answers life's
great end.
The time that bears no fruit, de-
serves no name:
The man of wisdom is the man of
years.
In hoaiy youth Methusalems may die ;
Oh, how misdated on their flattering
tombs !
[From Xii/ht Tlioiights.]
XIGHT V.
POWER OF THE WORLD.
Nor reason, nor affection, no, nor
both
Combined, can break the witchcrafts
of the world.
Behold, the inexorable hour at hand !
Behold, the inexorable hour forgot!
And to forget it the chief aim of
life;
Though well to ponder it, is life's
"chief end.
[From Xajht Thoiir/lits.]
XIGIIT VI.
ALL CHANGE; NO DEATH.
All change ; no death. Day follows
nigiit; and night
The dying day ; stars rise and set and
rise;
Earth takes the example. See, the
summer gay.
With her green chaplet and ambro-
sial flowers,
Droops into pallid autumn: winter
gt'ayi
Horrid with frost and turbulent with
storm,
Blows autumn, and his golden fruits
away :
Then melts into the spring: soft
spring, with breath
Favonian, from warm chambers of
the south, [fades,
Recalls the first. All, to reflourish.
As in a wheel, all sinks, to re-ascend.
Emblems of man, who passes, not
exi>ires.
With this minute distinction, em-
blems just.
Nature revolves, but man advances;
both
Eternal ; that a circle, this a line.
That gravitates, this soars. The as-
l^iring soul.
Ardent and tremulous, like flame,
ascends ;
Zeal and hiunility, her wings to
heaven.
The world of matter, with its various
forms,
All dies into new life. Life born
from death
Rolls the vast mass, and shall for
ever roll.
No single atom, once in being, lost.
[From Night Thoughts.']
NIGHT VII.
AMBITION.
Man must soar:
An obstinate activity within,
An insuppressive spring will toss
him up
In spite of fortune's load. Not kings
alone,
Each villager has his ambition too;
No sultan prouder than his fettered
slave: [straw.
Slaves build their little Babylons of
Echo the proud Assyrian, in their
hearts.
And cry — " Behold the wonders of
my might ! ' '
And why '? Because immortal as
their lord.
And souls immortal must for ever
heave
At something great; the glitter, or
the gold ;
The praise of mortals, or the praise
of Heaven.
684
YOUNG.
Nor absolutely vain is human
praise.
When human is supported by divine.
As love of pleasure is ordained to
guard
And feed our bodies, and extend our
race; [tect,
The love of praise is planted to pro-
And propagate the glories of the
mind.
[From JVif/ht Thoughts.]
XIGHT VIII.
WISDOM.
No man e'er found a happy life by
chance ;
Or yawned it into being with a wish;
Or, with the snout of grovelling ap-
petite.
E'er smelt it out, and grubbed it
from the dirt.
An art it is, and must be learned;
and learned
With unremitting effort, or be lost;
And leave us perfect blockheads, in
our bliss.
The clouds may drop down titles and
estates;
Wealth may seek us; but wisdom
must be sought ;
Sought before all; but (how unlike
all else
We seek on earth!) 'tis never sought
in vain.
{From Klght Thoughts.]
NIGHT IX.
CHEERFULNESS IX MISFORTUNE.
None ai-e imhappy: all have cause to
smile.
But such as to themselves that cause
deny. [pains ;
Our faults are at the bottom of our
Error, in act, or judgment, is the
source
Of endless sighs. We sin, or we
mistake;
And nature tax, when false oiiinicn
stings.
Let impious grief be banished, joy
indulged ;
But chiefly then, when grief puts in
her claim.
Joy from the joyous, frequently be-
trays ;
Oft lives in vanity, and dies in woe.
Joy amidst ills, corroborates, exalts;
'Tis joy and conquest; joy and virtue
too.
A noble fortitude in ills, delights
Heaven, earth, ourselves; 'tis duty,
glory, peace.
Affliction is the good man's shining
scene:
Prosperity conceals his brightest ray :
As night to stars, woe lustre gives to
man.
Heroes in battle, pilots in the storm,
And virtue in calamities, admire.
The crown of manhood is a winter
joy;
An evergreen that stands the north-
ern blast.
And blossoms in the rigor of our fate.
[From Night Thoughts.]
NIGIIT IX.
THE WORLD A GRAVE.
Where is the dust that has not
been alive ?
The spade, the plough, disturb our
ancestors ;
From human mould we reap our
daily bread.
Tlie globe around earth's hollow sur-
face shakes.
And is the ceiling of her sleeping sons.
O'er devastation we blind revels keep ;
While buried towns support the
dancer's heel.
The moist of human frame the sun
exhales;
Winds scatter, through the mighty
void, the dry;
Earth repossesses part of what she
gave.
And the freed spirit mounts on
wings of fire;
Each element partakes our scattered
spoils;
As nature, wide, our ruins spread:
man's death
Inhabits all things, but the thought
of man.
SPORTIVE, SATIRICAL, HUMOROUS,
DIALECT POEMS.
Charles Follen Adams.
YAWCOD STRAUSS.
I HAF von funny leedle poy
Vot gomes scliust to mine knee ;
Der queerest schap, der Greatest
rogue,
As efer you dit see.
He runs.und schumps,und schmashes
dings
In all barts off der house ;
But vot off dot ? he vas mine son,
Mine leedle Yawcob Strauss.
He get der measles and der niumbs,
Und eferyding dot's oudt;
He sbills mine glass off lager bier.
Foots schnnff indo mine kraut.
He fills mine pijie mit Limburj
clieese, —
Dot vas der roughest chouse:
I'd dake dot vrom no oder poy
But leedle Yawcob Strauss.
He dakes der milk-ban for a dhrum,
Und cuts mine cane in dwo.
To make der scliticks to beat it mit,—
Mine cracious, dot vas drue!
I dinks mine bed vas schplit abart.
He kicks onp sooch a touse:
But nefer mind; der poys vas few
Like dot young Yawcob Strauss.
He asks me questions such as dese:
Who baints mine nose so red ?
Who was it cuts dot schmoodtli blacc
oudt
Vrom der hair ubon mine hed ?
Und vhere der plaze goes vrom der
lamp
Vene'er der glim I douse,
How gan I all dose dings eggsblain
To dot schmall Yawcob Strauss ?
I somedimes dink I schall go wild
Mit sooch a grazy poy,
Und wish vonce more I gould haf
rest,
Und beaceful dimes enshoy;
^ut ven he vas ashleep in ped,
So guiet as a mouse,
I prays der Lord, "Hake anyding,
But leaf dot Yawcob Strauss."
PAT'S Cn/TfCISJf.
There's a story that's old.
But good if twice told.
Of a doctor of limited skill,
Who cured beast and man
On the " cold-water plan,"
Without the small help of a pill.
On his portal of pine
Hung an elegant sign.
Depicting a beautiful rill,
And a lake where a sprite,
With apparent delight.
Was sporting a sweet dishabille.
Pat McCarty one day,
As he sauntered that wav.
Stood and gazed at that portal
pine;
of
Note. — Thackeray's liouiUahaisse and Trowbridge's Vaqahonds, being really-
pathetic poems, are placed here lor convenience rather than fitness, their colloquial
style adapting them to this rather than the other department.
686
ALLINOIIAM.
When thfi doctor with pride
Stepped up to his side,
Saying, "Pat, how is that for a
sign ? "
" There's wan thing," says Pat,
" Y've hft out o' that,
"Which, be jabers! is quite a mistake:
It's trim, and it's nate: .
But, to make it complate,
Ye should have a foin burd on the
lake."
"Ah! indeed! pray, then tell,
* To make it look well.
What bird do you think it may lack? ' "
Says Pat, " Of the same,
I've forgotten the name.
But the song that he sings is ' Quack ! '
quack!' "
FRITZ AND I.
Mynheer, blease helb a boor oldt
man
Vot gomes vrom Sharmany,
Mit Fritz, mine tog, and only f reunds
To geep me company.
I haf no geld to puy mine pread,
No blace to lay me down ;
For ve vas vanderers, Fritz und I,
Und sdrangers in der town.
Some beoples gife us dings to eadt,
Und some dey kicks us oudt,
Und say, " You don'd got peesnis
here
To sdroU der schtreets aboudt ! ' '
Vot's dot you say ? — you puy mine
tog
To gife me pread to eadt!
I vas so boor as nefer vas,
But I vas no " tead peat."
Vot, sell mine tog, mine leedle tog.
Dot vollows me aboudt,
Und vags his dail like anydings
Vene'er I dakes him oudt ?
Schust look at him, und see him
schump !
He likes me pooty veil;
Und dere vas somedings 'bout dot
tog.
Mynheer, I wouldn't sell.
"Der collar?" Nein: 'tvas some-
ding else
Vrom vich I gould not hart ;
Und. if dot ding was dook avay
I dink it prakes mine heart.
" Vot was it, den, aboudt dot tog,"
You ashk, " dot's not vor sale ?"
1 dells you what it isli, mine freund :
'Tish der vag off dot tog's dail!
William Allingham.
LOVELY MARY DOXNELLY.
O T.OVEEV Mary Donnelly, it's you I love the best!
If fifty girls were round you, I'd hardly see the rest;
Be what it may the time of day, the place be where it will.
Sweet looks of Mary Donnelly, they bloom before me still.
Her eyes like mountain water that's flowing on a rock.
How clear they are, how dark they are! and they give me many a shock;
Bed rowans warm in sunshine, and wotted with a shower.
Could ne'er express the charming lip that has me in its power.
Her nose is straight and handsome, her eyebrows lifted up.
Her chin is very neat and pert, and smooth like a china cup;
Her hair's the brag of Ireland, so weighty and so fine —
It's rolling down upon her neck, and gathered in a twine.
BATES.
687
The dance o' last Whit Monday night exceeded all before —
No pretty girl for miles around was missing from the floor;
But Mary kept the belt of love, and O! but she was gay;
yiie danced a jig, she sung a song, and took my heart away!
When she stood up for dancing, her steps were so complete,
The music nearly killed itself, "to listen to her feet;
The fiddler mourned his blindness, he heard her so much praised;
But blessed himself he wasn't deaf when once her voice she raised.
And evermore I'm whistling or lilting what you sung;
Youi- smile is always in mylieart, your name beside my tongue.
But you"ve as many sweethearts as you'd count on both your hands,
And for myself there's not a thumb or little finger stands.
O, you're the flower of womankind, in country or in town;
The higher I exalt you the lower I'm cast down.
If some great lord should come this way and see your beauty bright,
And you to be his lady, I'd own it was but right.
O, might we live together in lofty palace hall
Where joyful music rises, and Avhere scarlet curtains fall I
O, might we live together in a cottage mean and small,
With sods of grass the only roof, and mud the only wall!
O, lovely Mary Donnelly, your beauty's my distress —
It's far too beauteous to be mine, but I'll never wish it less;
The proudest place would fit yoiu- face, and I am poor and low.
But blessings be about you, dear, wherever you may go !
Fletcher Bates.
THE CLEnGYMAiY AND THE
PEDDLER.
A CLEUGYiMAN who louged to trace
Amid his flock a work of grace,
And mourned because he knew not
why,
Yon fleece kept wet and his kept
dry,
AVhile thinking what he could do
more
Heard some one rapping at the door.
And opening it, there met his view
A dear old brother whom he knew,
Who had got down by worldly blows,
From wealth to peddling cast-off
clothes.
" Come in, my brother," said the
pastor,
*' Perhaps my trouble you can mas-
ter,
For since the summer you withdrew,
My converts have been very few."
" I can," the peddler said, " unroll
Something, perchance, to ease your
soul.
And to cut short all fulsome speeches.
Bring me a pair of your old breeches."
The clothes were brought, the ped-
dler gazed.
And said. " Xo longer be amazed,
The gloss upon this cloth is such,
I think, perhaps, you sit too much
Building air castles, bright and gay.
\Vhich Satan loves to IjIow away.
And here behold, as I am born.
The nap from neither kxrr is worn;
He who would great revivals see,
Must wear his pants out on the knee;
For such the lever prayer supplies.
When pastors kneel, their churches
rise."
688
BA YL Y— BROWNING.
Thomas Haynes Bayly.
WHY DOXT THE MEX PROPOSE?
\ViiY don't the men ijropose, maiu-
mu ?
Why dotit the men propose ?
Each seems just coining to the point,
And tlien away lie goes !
It is no fault of yours, mamma,
That everybody knows;
Youfete the finest men in town.
Yet, oh ! they won' t propose !
I'm sure I've done my best, mamma,
To make a proper match ;
For coronets and eklest sons
I'm ever on the watch;
I've hopes when some distingue
beau
A glance upon me throws ;
But though he'll dance, aud smile,
and flirt,
.Vlas ! he won't propose !
I've tried to win by languishing
And dressing like a blue ;
I've bought big books, and talk'd of
them
As if I'd read them through!
With hair cropped like a man, I've
felt
The heads of all the beaux ;
But Spurzheim could not touch their
liearts.
And, oil! they won't propose!
I threw aside the books, and thought
That ignorance was bliss;
I felt convinced that men preferr'd
A simple sort of Miss ;
And so I lisped out naught beyond
Plain '' Yeses " or plain " noes,"
And wore a sweet unmeaning smile;
Yet, oh ! they won' t propose !
Last night, at Lady Ramble's rout,
I heard Sir Harry Gale
Exclaim, " Now I projjo.se again!"
I started, turning pale;
I really thought my time was come,
I blushetl like any rose ;
But, oh! I found 'twas only at
Ecarte he'd projwse !
And what is to be done, mamma ?
Oh ! wliat is to be done ?
I really have no time to lose.
For I am thirty-one:
At balls I am too often left
AVhere spinsters sit in rows ;
Why won't the men propose, mam-
ma ?
Why won''t the men propose ?
Elizabeth Barrett Browning.
[From Aurora LeigJi.]
GOODiVESS.
Distrust that word.
"There is none good save God," said
Jesus Christ.
If He once, in the first creation-week.
Called creatures good, — for ever af-
terward.
The Devil has only done it, and his
heirs, [who lose;
The knaves who win so, and the fools
The world's grown dangerous. In
the middle age,
I think they called malignant fays
and imps
Good peoiile. A good neighbor, even
in this.
Is fatal sometimes, — cuts your morn-
ing up
To mince-meat of the very smallest
talk.
Then helps to sugar her boliea at
night
BROWNING.
689
With yoiir reputation. I have known
good wives,
As cliaste, or nea:rly so, as Potipliar's;
And good, good mothers, who would
use a cliild
To better an intrigue; good friends,
beside,
(Very good) wlio lumg succinctly
round your neck
And sucked your breath, as cats are
fableil to do
By sleeping infants. And we all have
known
Good critics, who have stamped out
poets' hopes;
Good statesmen, who pulled ruin on
the state;
Good patriots, who, for a theory,
risked a cause;
Good kings, who disembowelled for
a tax;
Good popes, who brought all good to
jeopardy ;
Good Christians, who sate still in
easy chairs,
And damned the general world for
standing up. —
Now, may the good God pardon all
good men!
[From Aurora Leif/h.]
ClilTICS.
My critic Hammond flatters prettily.
And wants another volume like tlie
last.
My critic Belfair wants another book.
Entirely different, which will sell,
(and live ?)
A striking book, yet not a startling
book.
The public blames originalities,
(You must not pump spring water
imawares
Upon a gracious public, full of
nerves — )
Good things, not subtle, new, yet
orthodox.
As easy reading as the dog-eared page
That's fingered by said public, fifty
years,
Since first taught spelling by its
grandmother,
And yet a revelation in some sort :
That's hard, my critic Belfair! So
— what next ?
My critic Stokes objects to abstract
thoughts ;
" Call a man, John, a woman, Joan,"
says he,
" And do not prate so of humani-
ties:"
Whereat I call my critic simply
Stokes.
My critic Johnson recommends more
mirth
Because a cheerful genius suits the
times.
And all true poets laugh unquencha-
bly
Like Shakespeare and the gods.
That's very hard.
The gods may laugh, and Shake-
speare ; Dante smiled
With such a needy heart on two pale
lips.
We cry, " Weep rather, Dante." Po-
ems are
Men, if true poems: and who dares
exclaim
At any man's door, " Here, 'tis un-
derstood
The thunder fell last week and killed
a wife,
And scared a sickly husband — what
of that ?
Get up, be merry, shout and clap
your hands,
Because a cheerful genius suits the
times — ? "
None says so to the man, — and why
indeed
Should any to the poem ?
[From Aurnra Leir/h.]
HUMANITY.
Humanity is great;
And, if I would not rather pore upon
An ounce of common, ugly, human
dust.
An artisan's palm or a peasant's
brow,
Unsmooth, ignoble, save to me and
God,
BROWNING.
Than track old Nilus to his silver
roots.
And wait on all the changes of the
moon
Among the mountain-peaks of Thes-
saly,
(Until her magic crystal round itself
For many a witch to see in) set it down
As weakness — strength by no means.
How is this
That men of science, osteologists
And surgeons, beat some poets in
respect
For nature, — count nought common
or unclean, [mens
Spend raptures upon perfect speci-
Of indurated veins, distorted joints.
Or beautiful new cases of curved
spine;
While we, we are shocked at nature's
falling off.
We dare to shrink back from her
warts and blains.
We will not, when she sneezes, look
at her.
Not even to say, " God bless her,"
That's our wrong.
For that, she will not trust us often
with
Her larger sense of beauty and de-
sire,
But tethers us to a lily or a rose
And bids us diet on the dew inside.
Left ignorant that the hungry beg-
gar-boy
(Who stares unseen against our ab-
sent eyes.
And wonders at the gods that we
must be.
To pass so carelessly for the oranges I)
Bears yet a breastful of a fellow-
world
To this world, undisparaged, unde-
spoiled.
And (while we scorn him for a flower
or two.
As being. Heaven help us, less poet-
ical)
Contains himself both flowers and
firmaments
And surging seas and aspectable stars
And all that we would push him out
of sight
In order to see nearer.
Robert Browning.
THE PIED PIPER OF IIAMELIN.
Hamei.ix Town's in Brunswick,
By famous Hanover city ;
The river Weser, deep and wide,
Washes its M'all on the southern
side;
A pleasanter spot you never spied ;
But Avhen begins my ditty,
Almost five hundred years ago.
To see the townsfolk suffer so
From vermin, was a pity.
Rats!
They fought the dogs, and killed the
cats,
And bit the babies in the cradles.
And ate the cheeses out of the vats.
And licked the soup from the cook's
own ladles.
Split open the kegs of salted sprats.
Made nests inside men's Sunday hats.
And even spoiled the women's chats,
By drowning their speaking
With shrieking and squeaking
In fifty different sharps and flats.
At last the people in a body
To the Town Hall came flocking:
"'Tis clear," cried they, "our mayor's
a noddy ;
And as for our corporation— shock-
ing
To think Ave buy gowns lined with
ermine
For dolts that can't or Avon't deter-
mine
What's best to rid us of oiu- vermin!
You hope, because you're old and
obese,
To find in the furry civic robe ease ?
Iiouse up, sirs! Give your brains a
racking.
BROWNING.
691
To find the remedy we're lacking,
Or, sure as fate, we'll send you pack-
ing!"
At this, the mayor and corporation
Quaked with a mighty consternation.
An hour they sate in counsel —
At length the mayor broke silence:
" For a guilder I'd my ermine gown
sell:
1 wish 1 were a mile hence!
It's easy to bid one rack one's brain —
I'm sure my poor head aches again,
I've scratched it so, and all in vain.
Oh, for a trap, a trap, a trap! "
Just as he said this, what should hap
At the chamber door but a gentle
tap ?
" Bless us," cri,ed the mayor, " what's
that?"
(^Vith the corporation as he sat,
Looking little, though wondrous fat;
Nor brighter was his eye, nor moister.
Than a too-long-opened oyster.
Save when at noon liis paunch grew
mutinous
For a plate of turtle, green and glu-
tinous)
*' Only a scraping of shoes on the
. ■ mat ?
Anything like the sound of a rat
jMakes my heart go pit-a-pat! "
"Come in!" the mayor cried, look-
ing bigger:
And in did come the strangest figure !
His queer long coat from heel to head
Was half of yellow and half of red:
And he himself was tall and thin;
^Vith sharp blue eyes, each like a pin :
And light loose hair, yet swarthy
skin;
No tuft on cheek, nor beard on chin.
But li])s where smiles went out and
in —
There was no guessing his kith and
kin!
And nobody could enough admire
The tall man and his quaint attire.
Quoth one: "It's as my great-grand-
sire, [tone.
Starting up at the trump of doom's
Had walked this way from his painted
tombstone! "
He advanced to the comicil-table : ^
And, '• Please your honors,'" said he,
"I'm able.
By means of a secret charm, to draw
All creatures living beneath the sun.
That creep, or swim, or fly, or run,
After me so as you never saw !
And I chiefly use my charm
On creatures that do people harm —
The mole, and toad, and newt, and
viper —
And people call me the Pied Piper."
(And here they noticed round his
neck
A scarf of red and yellow stripe,
To match with his coat of the self-
same check ;
And at the scarf's end hung a pipe;
And his fingers, they noticed, were
ever straying
As if impatient to be playing
Upon this pipe, as low it dangled
Over his vesture so old-fangled. )
" Yet," said he, " poor piper as I
am,
In Tartary I freed the Cham,
Last June, from his huge swarm of
gnats;
I eased in Asia the Nizam
Of a monstrous brood of vampire-
bats;
And, as for what your brain bewil-
ders —
If I can rid your town of rats,
AVill you give me a thousand guil-
ders?"
"One? fifty thousand!" — was the
exclamation
Of the astonished mayor and corpo-
ration.
Into the street the piper stept,
Smiling first a little smile.
As if he knew what magic slept
In his quiet pipe the while;
Then, like a musical adept.
To blow the pipe his lips he wrinkled.
And green and blue his sharp eyes
twinkled.
Like a caudle flame where salt is
sprinkled;
And ere three shrill notes the pipe
uttered.
You heard as if an army muttered ;
692
BROWNING.
And the muttering grew to a gi-uin-
bling:
And the grumbhng grew to a mighty
rumbling;
And out of the liouses the rats came
tumbling.
Great rats, small rats, lean rats,
brawny rats,
Brown rats, black rats, grey rats,
tawny rats.
Grave old plodders, gay young frisk-
ers.
Fathers, mothers, imcles, cousins.
Cocking tails and pricking whiskers;
Families by tens and dozens, ,
Brothers, sisters, husbands, Avives —
Followed the piper for their lives.
From street to street he piped advan-
cing.
And step by step they followed dan-
cing,
Until they came to the river Weser
Wherein all plunged and perished
— Save one who, stout as Julius
Caesar,
Swam across and lived to carry
(As he the manuscript he cherished)
To rat-land home his commentary,
Which was : "At the first shrill notes
of the pipe,
I heard a sound as of scraping tripe,
And putting apples, wondrous ripe.
Into a cider-press's gripe —
And a moving away of pickle-tub-
boards.
And a leaving ajar of conserve-cup-
boards.
And a drawing the corks of train-oil-
flasks,
And a breaking the hoops of butter-
casks.
And it seemed as if a voice
(Sweeter far than by harp or by
psaltery
Is breathed) called out, O rats, re-
joice !
The world is grown to one vast dry-
saltery I
So munch on, crunch on, take your
nuncheon.
Breakfast, supper, dinner, luncheon!
And just as a bulky sugar-puncheon.
All ready staved, like a great sun
shone
Glorious, scarce an inch before me,
Just as methought it said. Come,
Ijore me,
— I fomid the Weser rolling o'er
me."
You should have heard the Hamelin
people
Ringing the bells till they rocked the
steeple ;
" Go," cried the mayor, " and get
long poles !
Poke out the nests and block up the
holes !
Consult with carpenters and builders.
And leave in our town not even a
trace
Of the rats!" — when suddenly, up
the face
Of the piper perked in the market-
place,
With a, "First, if you please, my
thousand guilders!"
A thousand giiilders! The mayor
looked blue;
So did the corporation too.
For the council dinners made rare
havoc
With claret. Moselle, Vin-de-Grave,
Hock;
And half the money would replenish
Their cellar's biggest butt with Ilhen-
ish.
To pay this sum to a wandering fel-
low
With a gipsy coat of red and yellow !
"Beside," quoth the mayor, with a
knowing wink,
" Om- business was done at the river's
brink; [sink.
We saw witli our eyes the vermin
And whafs dead can't come to life,
I think.
So, friend,- we're not the folks to
shrink
From the duty of giving you some-
thing for drink.
And a matter of money to put in
your poke ;
But, as for the guilders, what we
spoke
Of them, as you very well know, was
in joke,
BROWNING.
693
Besides, our losses have made us
thrifty ;
A thousand guilders! Come, take
fifty!"
The piper's face fell, and he cried,
'• No trilling! I can't wait! heside,
I've promised to visit by dinner
time
Bagdat, and accept the prime
Of the head cook's pottage, all he's
rich in.
For having left, in the Caliph's kitch-
en,
Of a nest of scorpions no survivor —
With him I proved no bargain-
driver;
With you, don't think I'll bate a
stiver!
And folks who put me in a passion
May find me pipe to another fash-
ion."
"How?" cried the mayor, "d'ye
think I'll brook
Being worse treated tlian a cook ?
Insulted by a lazy ribald
AVitli idle pipe and vesture piebald ?
You threaten us, fellow ? Do your
worst.
Blow your i^ipe there till you biu'st ! "
Once more he stept into the street;
And to his lips again
Laid his long pipe of smooth straight
cane;
And ere he blew three notes (such
sweet
Soft notes as yet musician's cunning
Never gave the enraptured air)
There was a rustling that seemed like
a bustling
Of merry crowds justling at pitching
and hustling;
Small feet were pattering, wooden
slices clattering.
Little hands clapping, and little
tongues chattering;
And, like fowls in a farm-yard when
barley is scattering.
Out came the children running.
All the little boys and girls,
With rosy cheeks and flaxen curls.
And sparkling eyes and teeth like
pearls.
Tripping and skipping, ran merrily
after
The wonderful music with shouting
and laughter.
The mayor was dumb, and the coun-
cil stood
As if they were clianged into blocks
of wood,
LTnable to move a step, or cry
To the children merrily skipping by —
And could only follow with the eye
That joyous crowd at the piper's
back.
But how the mayor was on the rack.
And the wretched council's bosoms
beat.
As the piper turned from tlie High
Street
To wliere the Weser rolled its waters
Eight in the way of their sons and
daughters !
However, he turned from south to
west, [dressed.
And to Koppelberg Hill his steps ad-
And after him the children pressed;
Great was the joy in every breast.
" He never can cross that mighty top I
He's forced to let the piping drop,
And we shall see oin- children stop!"
When, lo, as they reached the moun-
tain's side,
A wondrous portal opened wide.
As if a cavern was suddenly hol-
lowed ;
And the piper advanced and the
children followed;
And when all were in, to the very
last.
The door in the mountain side shut
fast.
Did I say all ? No ! One was lame.
And could not dance the whole of the
way !
And in after years, if you would
blame
His sadness, he was used to say, —
" It's dull in our town since my play-
mates left !
I can't forget that I'm bereft
Of all the pleasant sights they see,
Which the piper also promised me;
For he led us, he said, to a joyous
land.
Joining the town and just at hand,
^m
69-4
BROWNING.
Where waters gushed and fruit-trees
grew,
And flowers put forth a fairer hue,
And every thing was strange and
new ;
The sparrows were brighter than pea-
cocks here,
And their dogs outran our fallow
deer,
And honey-bees had lost their stings,
And liorses were born witli eagles'
wings ;
And just as I became assured
My lame foot would be speedily cured,
The music stopped and I stood still,
And found myself outside the Hill,
Left alone against my will.
To go now limping as before,
And never hear of that country
more ! "
Alas, alas for Hamelin !
There came into many a burgher's
pate
A text which says that Heaven's
Opes to the rich at as easy rate
As the needle's eye takes a camel in!
The mayor sent east, west, north, and
south,
To offer the piper by word of mouth.
Wherever it was men's lot to find
him.
Silver and gold to his heart's content.
If he'd only return the way he went.
And bring the children behind him.
But Mhen they saw 'twas a lost en-
deavor.
And piper and dancers were gone for-
ever.
They made a decree that lawyers
never
Should think their records dated
duly
If, after the day of the month and
year
These words did not as well appear:
' ' And so long after what happened
here
On the twenty-second of July,
Thirteen hundred and seventy-six;"
And the better in memory to fix
The place of the children's last re-
treat
They called it the Pied Piper's Street;
Where any one playing on pipe or
tabor
Was sure for the future to lose his
labor.
Nor suffered they hostelry or tavern
To shock with mirth a street so
solemn ;
But opposite the place of the cavern
They wrote the story on a column.
And on the great church window
painted
The same, to make the world ac-
quainted
Plow their children were stolen away;
And there it stands to this very day.
And I must not omit to say
That in Transylvania there's a tribe
Of alien people that ascribe
The outlandish ways and dress
On which their neighbors lay such
stress
To their fathers and mothers having
risen
Out of some subterranean prison
Into which they were trepanned
Long time ago. in a mighty band.
Out of Hamelin town in Brunswick
land.
But how or why, they don't unibn*-
stand.
So, Willy, let you and me be wipers
Of scores out with all men — especially
pipers :
And, whether they pipe us free from
rats or from mice.
If we've promised them aught, let us
keep our promise.
BURNS.
695
Robert Burns.
TAM O' SHANTEll.
A TALE.
Brownyis and of Bogilis, full is this Buke.
— Gawin Douglas.
When chapman billies leave the
street,
And (Irouthy neebors, neebors meet,
As market-days are wearing late,
An' folk begin to tak the gate ;
While we sit bousing at the napj)y,i
An' getting fou and unco happy,
We tiiinkna on the iang Scots miles.
The mosses, waters, slaps and stiles,
That lie between us and our hame.
Whare sits our sulky sullen dame
Gath'ring her brows like gatli'ring
storm,
Nursing her wrath to keep it warm'.
This truth fand honest Tarn O'
Shanter,
As he frae Ayr ae night did canter
(Auld Ayr, Avham ne'er a town sur-
passes.
For honest men and bonnie lasses).
O Tam! hadst thou but been sae
wise.
As ta'en thy ain wife Kate's advice!
She tauld thee weel thou wast a
skellum.-
A blethering, blustering, drunken
blellum ; ^
That frae November till October,
Ae market-day thou was nae sober;
That ilka mekler,* wi' the miller.
Thou sat as Iang as thou had siller;
That ev'ry naig was ca'd a shoe on,
The smith and thee gat roaring fou
on.
That at the Lord's house, ev'n on
Sunday,
Thou drank wi' Kirkton^ Jane till
Monday.
She prophesy' d that, late or soon.
Thou would be found deep drown' d
in Doon ;
Or catch" d wi' warlocks ^ i' the mirk,^
By Alloway's auld haunted kirk.
Ah, gentle dames! it gars me
greet,*
To think how mony counsels sweet,
How mony lengthen' d, sage advices,
The husband frae the wife despises!
But to our tale : A market night,
Tam had got planted unco right ;
Fast by an ingle, bleezing finely.
Wi' reaming swats,^ that drank di-
vinely;
And at his elbow, Souter Johnny,
His ancient, trusty, drouthy crony;
Tam lo'ed him like a vera brither:
They had been fou for weeks the-
gither.
The night drave on wi' sangs and
clatter ;
And ay the ale was growing better;
The landlady and Tam grew gracious,
Wi' favors, secret, sweet, and pre-
cious :
The souteri'' tauld his queerest stories ;
The landlord's laugh was ready
chorus : [rustle,
The storm without might rair and
Tam did na mind the storm a whistle.
Care, mad to see a man sa happy.
E'en drowned himself amang the
nappy! [ure,
As bees flee hame wi' lades o' treas-
The minutes wing'd their way wi'
pleasure ;
Kings may be blest, but Tam was
glorious.
O'er a' the ills o' life victorious!
But pleasures are like poppies
spread, [shed ;
You seize the flow'r, its bloom is
^ Ale. - Worthless fellow. s Idle talker.
^ Every time that corn was sent to be ground.
p Kirkton is the distinctive name of a village in wliicli the parish kirk stands.
•"' Wizards. ' Dark. 8 Makes me weep.
9 Frothing ale. '" Shoemaker.
696
BURNS.
Or like the snow falls in the river,
A moment wliite — then melts for
ever :
Or like the borealis race,
That tlit ere you can point their place :
Or like the rainbow's lovely form
Evanishing amid the storm.
Nae man can tether time or tide ; —
The hour approaches Tarn maun
ride :
That hour, o' night's black arch the
key-stane,
That dreary hour he mounts his beast
in;
And sic a night he taks the road
in.
As ne'er poor sinner was abroad in.
The wind blew as ' tMad blawn its
last;
The rattling show'rs rose on the
blast ;
The speedy gleams the darkness
swallow'd;
Loud, deep, and lang, the thunder
bellow' d;
That night, a child might understand.
The Deil had business on his hand.
Weel mounted on his grey mare,
Meg,
A better, never lifted leg.
Tarn skelpit i on throu' dub and
mire.
Despising wind, and rain, and fire;
Whiles holding fast his gude blue
bonnet ;
Whiles crooning o'er some auld Scots
sonnet ;
Whiles glow'ring round wi' prudent
cares,
Lest bogles catch him unawares ;
Kirk Alloway was drawing nigh,
Whare ghaists and houlets nightly
cry
By this time lie was cross the ford,
Whare in the snaw the chapman
smoor'd;-
And past the birks^ and meikle *
stane,
Whare drunken Charlie brak's neck-
bane;
And thro' the whins, and by the
cairn,
Whare hunters fand the murder' d
bairn ;
And near the thorn, aboon the well,
Whare Mungo's mither haug'd her-
sel.
Before him Doon pours all his
floods ;
The doubling storm roars thro' the
woods ;
The lightnings flash from pole to
pole ;
Near and more near the thunders
roll:
When, glimmering thro' the groan-
ing trees.
Kirk Alloway seem'd in a bleeze;
Thro' ilka bore^ the beams were
glancing ;
And loud resounded mirth and danc-
ing.
Inspiring bold John Barleycorn !
What dangers thou canst make us
scorn !
Wi' tippeny, we fear nae evil :
Wi' usquebae, we'll face the Devil !
The swats sae ream'd in Tammie's
noddle.
Fair play, he car'd na deils a boddle.
But Maggie stood right sair aston-
ish'd,
Till, by the heel and hand admon-
ished.
She ventured forward on the light;
And woM- ! Tam saw an luico sight !
Warlocks and witches in a dance :
Xae cotillion brent new frae France.
But hornpipes, jigs, strathspeys, and
reels.
Put life and mettle in their heels.
At winnock-bunker'^ in the east.
There sat auld Nick, in shape o'
beast ;
A towzie'' tyke, black, grim, and
large.
To gie them music, was his charge:
He screw'd the pipes and gart ^ them
skirl,9
Till roof and rafters a' did dirl. —
1 Went at a smart pace.
2 Smothered.
3 Birches,
4 Big.
5 Hole in the wall.
Window-seat.
' Shaggy.
* P'orceil.
9 Scream.
BUBNS.
697
Coffins stood roimd, like open presses,
That shaw'd the dead in their last
dresses ;
And by some devilish cantrip ^ slight
Each in its cauld hand held a light, —
By which heroic Tarn was able
To note upon the haly table,
A murderer's banes in gibbet airns;-
Twa span-lang, wee, unchristen'd
bairns ;
A thief, new-cutted frae a rape,
Wi' his last gasp his gab did gape;
Five tomahawks, wi' blude red rusted ;
Five scimitars, wi' murder crusted ;
A garter, which a babe had strangled ;
A knife, a father's throat had man-
gled.
Whom his ain son o' life bereft.
The gray hairs yet stack to tlie heft ;
Wi' mair o' horrible and awf u' ,
Which ev'n to name wad be im-
lawfu'.
As Tammie glowr'd, amaz'd and
curious.
The mirth and fun grew fast and
furious:
The piper loud and louder blew ;
The dancers quick and quicker
flew;
They reel'd, they set, they cross'd,
they cleekit,
Till ilka carlin swat and reekit,
And coost her duddies^ to the wark.
And linket ^ at it in her sark !
Now Tam, O Tam! had thae been
queans
A' i^lunip and strapping in their
teens;
Their sarks, instead o' creeshie ^
flannen,
Been snaw-white seventeen-hunder
linnen!''
Thir" breeks o' mine, my only pair,
That ance were plush, o' gude blue
hair,
I wad a gi'en them off my hurdles,^
For ae blink o' the bonnie burdies!
But wither'd beldams, auld and
droll,
Rigwoodie hags, wad spean a foal,
Lowjiing and flinging on a crum-
mock,'-*
I wonder didna turn the stomach.
But Tam kend what was what fu'
brawlie,
"There was ae winsome wench and
walie,"
That night enlisted in the core,
(Lang after kend on Carrick shore;
For mony a beast to dead she shot.
And iierish'd mony a bonnie boat.
And shook baith meikle corn and
bear,i'5
And kept the country-side in fear).
Her cutty i^ sark, o' Paisley harn,i-
That, while a lassie, she had M'orn,
In longitude though sorely scanty.
It was her best, and she was vauntie —
Ah! little kend thy reverend gran-
nie.
That sark she coft i^ for her wee
Nannie,
Wi' twa pund Scots ('twas a' her
riches).
Wad ever grac'd a dance of witches!
But here my muse her wing maun
cour ;
Sic flights are far beyond her pow'r;
To sing how Nannie lap and flang
(A souple jade she was, and Strang),
And how Tam stood, like ane be-
witch'd.
And thought his very e'en enrich'd;
Even Satan glowr'd, and fidg'd fu'
fain,
And hotch'd and blew wi' might and
main:
Till first ae caper, syne i^ anither,
Tam tint ^-^ his reason a' thegither.
And roars out, "Weel done, Cutty-
sark!"
And in an instant all was dark;
And scarcely had he Maggie i-allied,
When out the hellish legion sallied.
1 Magic.
- Irons.
The manufacturing
Cromek.
1 These
8 Loins.
9 Short stair.
3 Clotlies. 6 Greasy.
^ Tripped along,
term for a fine linen, woven in a reel of 1700 divisions.—
" Barley.
" Short.
^- Very coarse linen.
13 Bought.
" Then.
" Lost.
698
BURNS.
As bees bizz out wi' angry fyke,i
When plundering herds assail theid
byke;^^ *1
As open pussie's mortal foes, '
Wlien, pop! she starts before their
nose;
As eager runs the market-crowd,
When, " Catch the thief !" resounds
aloud ;
80 Maggie runs, the witches follow,
Wi' mony an eldritch skreech and
hollow.
Ah, Tani! ah, Tam! thou'll get
thy fairin !
In hell they'll roast thee like a her-
rin !
In vain thy Kate awaits thy comin !
Kate soon will be a woefu' woman !
Now, do thy speedy utmost, Meg,
And win the key-stane ^ of the brig ;
There at them thou thy tail may toss,
A running stream they dare na cross.
But ere the key-stane she could make.
The fient a tail she had to shake !
P'or Nannie, far before the rest.
Hard upon noble Maggie prest.
And flew at Tam wi' furious ettle;*
But little Avist she Maggie's mettle —
Ae spring bi-ought off her master
hale.
But left behind her ain gray tail;
The carlin clauglit her by the rump,
And left poor Maggie scarce a stump.
Now, who this "tale of truth shall
read.
Ilk man and mother's son, tak heed;
Whene'er to drink you are inclin'd,
Or cutty-sarks run in your mind,
Think, ye may buy the joys o'er dear,
Remember 'J'am O' Chanter's mare.
FROM THE "LIKES TO A LOUSE."
Now baud ye there, ye're out o' sight,
Below the fatt'rils,^ snug and tight;
Na, faith ye yet! ye" 11 no be right
Till ye've got on it,
The vera topmost, tow'rhig height
O' Miss's bonnet.
I wad na been surpris'd to spy
You on an auld wife's flainen toy;**
Or aiblins some bit duddie boy,
On 's wyliecoat:''
But Miss's fine Lunardi!** fie.
How daur ye do't?
O ,Ienny, dinna toss your head,
An' set your beauties a' abread!
Ye little ken what cursed speed
The blastie's'-* makin!
Thae winks and finger-ends. 1 dread.
Are notice takin !
O wad some Pow'r the giftie gie us
To see oursels as others see us !
It wad frae mony a blunder free us
And foolish notion ;
What airs in dress and gait wad lea'e
us.
And ev'n devotion!
1 Bustle, 2 Jrive.
^ It is a well-known fact that witches, or any evil spirits have no power to follow
a poor wight any farther than the middle of the liext running stream. It may be proper
likewise to mention to the benighted traveller, that when he falls in with bogles,
whatever danger may be in his going forward, there is much more hazard in turning
back. — K. B.
* Effort. 5 Ribbon-ends.
'■ An old-fashioned head-dress. ' Flannel vest.
" A bonnet, named after Lunardi, whose balloon made him notorious in Scotland
about 1785.
" The shrivelled dwarf.
Samuel Butler.
[From Hiulibira.]
THE LEARNING OF HUD IB R AS.
Hk was in logic a great critic,
Profoundly skill'd in analytic;
He could distinguish and divide
A hair 'twixt south and south-west
side;
On either which he would dispute,
Confute, change hands, and still con-
fute.
He'd undertake to prove, hy force
Of argmnent, a man's no horse.
He'd prove a huzzard is no fowl,
And that a lord may be an owl,
A calf an alderman, a goose a jus-
tice,
And rooks committee-men and trus-
tees.
He'd run in debt by disputation.
And pay with ratiocination.
All this by syllogism, true
In mood and figure he would do.
For Rhetoric, he could not ope
His mouth, but out there flew a
trope :
And when he happened to break off
In the middle of his speech, or cough.
He had hard words ready to shew
why.
And tell what rules he did it by:
Else, when with greatest art he spoke,
You' d think he talk'd like other
folk:
For all a rhetorician's rules
Teach nothing but to name his tools.
But, when he pleas' d to shew't, his
speech.
In loftiness of sound, was rich;
A Babylonish dialect,
AVhich learned pedants much affect.
It was a party-color'd dress
Of patch'd and piebald languages:
'Twas English cut on Greek and La-
tin,
Like fustian heretofore on satin.
It had an odd promiscuous tone,
As if he'd talked three parts in
one;
Which made some think, when he
did gabble,
They'd heard three laborers of Babel;
Or Cerberus himself pronounce
A leash of languages at once.
This he as volubly would vent
As if his stock would ne'er be spent;
And truly to support that clsarge,
He had supplies as vast and large;
For he could coin or counterfeit
New words with little or no wit:
Words, so debas'd and hard, no stone
Was hard enough to touch them on:
And when with hasty noise he spoke
'em,
The ignorant for current took 'em;
That hail the orator, who once
Did fill his mouth with ijebble-stones
When he harangued, but known his
phrase.
He would have used no other ways.
In Mathematics he was greater
Than Tycho Brahe or Erra Pater:
For he, by geometric scale,
Could take "the size of pots of ale;
Resolve, by signs and tangents,
straight.
If bread or butter wanted weight;
And wisely tell what hour o' th' day
The clock does strike, by algebra.
Beside he was a shrewd philosopher,
And had read ev'ry text and gloss
over.
Whate'er the crabbed'st author hath.
He understood by implicit faith :
AVhatever sceptic could inquire for,
For ev'ry why he had a wherefore;
Knew more than forty of them do.
As far as words and terms could go :
All which he understood by rote.
And, as occasion serv'd, would quote
No matter whether right or wrong,
They might be either said or sung.
His notions fitted things so well,
Tliiit which was which he could not
tell
But oftentimes mistook the one
For th' other, as great clerks have
done.
700
BUTLER.
He could reduce all things to acts,
And knew their natures by abstracts ;
Where entity and quiddity.
The ghosts of defunct bodies fly.
Where truth in person does appear,
Like words cougeal'd in northern
air.
He knew what's what, and that's as
high
As metapliysic wit can fly.
[From Iludibras.]
THE BIBLICAL KSOW LEDGE AND
IIELIGION OF HUDIBUAS.
He knew the seat of Paradise,
Could tell in what degree it lies;
And, as he was disposed, could prove
it
Below the moon, or else above it:
What Adam dreamt of, when his
bride
Came from her closet in his side;
Whether the devil tempted her
By a High-Dutch interpreter:
If either of them had a navel :
Who first made music malleable ;
Whether the serpent, at the fall.
Had cloven feet or none at all.
All this without a gloss or comment.
He could unriddle in a moment,
In proper terms, such as men smat-
ter.
When they throw out and miss the
matter.
For his religion, it was fit
To match his learning and his wit:
'Twas Presbyterian true blue;
For he was of that stubborn crew
Of errant saints whom all men grant
To be the true church militant;
Such as do build their faith upon
The holy text of pike and gun;
Decide all controversies by
Infallible artillery ;
And prove their doctrine orthodox
By apostolic blows and knocks.
A sect whose chief devotion lies
In odd perverse antipathies:
In falling out with that or this.
And finding somewhat still amiss :
More peevish, cross, and splenetic,
Than dog distract, or monkey sick;
That with more care keep holy-day
The wrong, than others the right
way :
Compound for sins they are inclined
to,
By damning those they have no mind
to:
Still so perverse and opposite,
As if they worshipped God for spite.
The self-same thing they will abhor
One way, and long another for.
Free-will they one way disavow;
Another, nothing else allow.
All piety consists therein
In them, in other men all sin.
Bather than fail they will decry
That which they love most tenderly;
Quarrel with minced pie, and dispar-
age
Their best and dearest friend, plum-
porridge.
[From lluilibrus.]
THE KXIGHT'S STEED.
The beast was sturdy, large, and
tall.
With mouth of meal, and eyes of
wall.
I wovdd say eye ; for he had but one.
As most agree : tho' some say none.
He was well stayed : and in his gait
Preserved a grave majestic state.
At spur or switch no more he skipt.
Or mended pace than Spaniard
whipt;
And yet so fiery he would bound
As if he grieved to touch the ground :
That Ca?sar's horse, avIio as fame
goes
Had corns upon his feet and toes,
AVas not by half so tender hooft.
Nor trod upon the ground so soft.
And as that beast would kneel and
stoop
(Some write) to take his rider up.
So Hudibras his ('tis well known)
Woidd often do to set him down.
We sliall not need to say what lack
Of leather was upon his back;
BUTLER.
701
For that was hidden under pad,
And breech of knight galled full as
bad.
His strutting ribs on both sides
showed
Like furrows he himself had
ploughed ;
For underneath the skirt of pannel.
'Twixt every two tliere was a chan-
nel.
His draggling tail Ining in the
dirt,
Which on his rider he would flirt,
Still as his tender side he pricked,
Witla armed heel, or with unarmed,
kiclved ;
For Hudibras wore but one spur:
As wisely knowing, could he stir «
To active trot one side of 's horse,
The other would not hang an arse.
[From Hudibras.]
THE PLEASURE OF BEING CHEATED,
Doubtless the pleasure is as great
Of being cheated, as to cheat:
As lookers-on feel most delight,
That least perceive a juggler's sleight :
And still the less they understand,
The more they admire his sleight of
hand.
William Allen Butler.
FROM "NOTHING TO WEAR.''
Nothing to avear! Now, as this
is a true ditty,
I do not assert — this, you know,
is between us —
That she's in a state of absolute nu-
dity.
Like Powers' Greek Slave or the
Medici Venus ;
But I do mean to say, I have heard
her declare.
When at the same moment she had
on a dress
Which cost five lumdred dollars,
and not a cent less.
And jewelry worth ten times more,
I should guess,
That she had not a thing in the wide
world to wear !
I should mention just here, that out
of Miss Flora's
Two hundred and fifty or sixty
adorers,
I had just been selected as he who
should throw all
The rest in the shade, by the gra-
cious bestowal
On myself, after twenty or thirty re-
jections.
Of those fossil remains which she
called her "affections,"
And that rather decayed, but well-
known work of art.
Which Miss Flora persisted in styl-
ing lier " heart."
So we were engaged. Our troth had
been plighted.
Not by moonbeam or starbeam, liy
fountain or grove.
But in a front parlor, most brilliantly
lighted,
Beneath the gas-fixtures, we whis-
pered our love.
Without any romance, or raptures,
or sighs.
Without any tears in Miss Flora's
blue eyes.
Or blushes, or transports, or such
silly actions.
It was one of the quietest business
transactions.
With a very small sprinkling of sen-
timent, if any,
And a very large diamond imported
by Tiffany.
On her virginal lips while I printed a
kiss,
She exclaimed, as a sort of paren-
thesis,
And by way of putting me quite at
my ease,
" You know I'm to polka as much as
I please,
702
BUTLER.
And flirt when I like — now, stop,
don't you speak —
And you must not come liere more
tlian twice in tlie week.
Or tallv to me eitlier at party or ball.
But always be ready to come when I
call ;
80 don't jirose to me about duty and
stuff.
If we don't lireak this off, there will
be time enough
For that sort of thing; but the bar-
gain must be
That, as long as I choose, I am per-
fectly free, —
For this is a kind of engagement,
you see.
Which is binding on you, but not
binding on me."
Well, having thus wooed Miss M'-
Flimsey and gained her,
With the silks, crinolines, and hoops
that contained her,
I had, as I thought, a contingent re-
. mainder
At least in the property, and the best
riglit
To appear as its escort by day and by
night;
And it being the week of the Stuck-
ups' grand ball, —
Their cards had been out a fort-
night or so,
And set all the Avenue on the tip-
toe, —
I considered it only my duty to call.
And see if Miss Flora intended to go.
1 found her — as ladies are apt to be
found.
When tlie time intervening between
the first sound
Of the bell and the visitor's entry is
shorter
Than usual — I found; I won't say
I caught her.
Intent on the pier-glass, undoubtedly
meaning
To see if perhaps it did n't need
cleaning.
She turned as I entered — " Why
Harry, you sinner,
I thought that you went to the Flash-
ers' to dinner ! ' '
" So I did," I replied, " but the din-
ner is swallowed.
And digested, 1 trust, for 't is now
nine and more.
So, being relieved from that duty, I
followed
Inclination, which led me, you see,
to your door;
And now Avill your ladyship so con-
descend
As just to inform me If you intend
Your beauty, and graces, and pres-
ence to lend
(All of which, when I own, I hope
no one will borrow)
To the Stuckups', wliose party, you
know, is to-morrow? "
The fair Flora looked up, with a
pitiful air,
And answered quite promptly,
"Why, Harry, rnon clier,
I should like above all things to go
with you there.
But really and truly — I've nothing
to wear."
"Nothing to wear! go just as you
are;
Wear the dress you have on, and
you '11 be by far,
I engage, the most bright and par-
ticular star
On the Stuckup horizon — " I
stopped, for her eye.
Notwithstanding tliis delicate onset
of flattery,
Openec>on me at once a most terrible
battery
Of scorn and amazement. She
made no reply.
But gave a slight turn to the end of
her nose,
(That pure Grecian feature,) as
nuieh as to say,
" IIow absurd that any sane man
should suppose
That a lady would go to a ball in the
clothes,
No matter how fine, that she wears
every day!"
So I ventured again; "Wear your
crimson brocade;"
(Second turn up of nose) — " That 's
too dark by a shade."
BUTLER.
703
"Your blue silk" — "That's too
heavy. " "Your pink" —
" That's too light."
Wear tulle over satin" — "I can't
endure white."
'■ Your rose-colored, then, the best
of the batch " —
" I have n't a thread of point-lace to
match."
"Your brown moire antique'' —
"Yes, and look like a Quaker;"
" The pearl-colored " — " 1 woUld, but
that plaguy dress-maker
Has had it a week." "Then that
exquisite lilac,
In which you would melt the heart
of a bhylock;"
(Here the nose took again the same
elevation) —
" I would n't wear that for the whole
of creation."
" Why not? It's my fancy, there 's
nothing could strike it
As more conime il J'ittit'" — " Y'es,
but dear me, that lean
Sophronia ytuckup has got one just
like it.
And I won't appear dressed like a
chit of sixteen."
" Then that splendid purple, that
sweet Mazarine ;
That superb 2^oint iV aiguille, that
imperial green,
That zephyr-like tarletan, that rich
grenadine " —
"Not one of all which is fit to be
seen," | flushed.
Said the lady, becoming excited and
"Then wear," I exclaimed, in a tone
which quite crushed
Opposition, "that gorgeous toi-
lette wliich you sported
In Paris last spring, at the grand pre-
sentation,
When you quite turned the head of
the head of the nation.
And by all the grand court were
so very much courted."
The end of the nose was portent-
ously tipped up,
And both the bright eyes shot forth
indignation,
As she burst upon me with the fierce
exclamation.
" I have worn it three times, at the
least calculation.
And that and most of my dresses
are rijiped up! "
I have told you and shown you I 've
nothing to wear,
And it 's perfectly plain you not only
don't cai'e.
But you do not believe me," (here the
nose went still higher),
•• I suppose, if you dared, you would
' call me a liar.
Our engagement is ended, sir, — yes,
on the spot:
You're a brute, and a monster, and
— I don't know what."
I mildly suggested the words Hot-
tentot,
Pickpocket, and cannibal, Tartar,
and thief,
As gentle expletives which might
give relief;
But this only proved as a spark to
the powder,
And the storm I had raised came
faster and louder;
It blew and it rained, thundered,
lightened, and hailed
Interjections, verbs, pronouns, till
language quite failed
To express the abusive, and then its
arrears
Were brought up all at once by a tor-
rent of tears.
AYell, I felt for the lady, and felt for
my hat, too.
Improvised on the crown of the lat-
ter a tattoo.
In lieu of expressing the feelings
which lay
Quite too deep for words, as Words-
woi'th would say;
Then, without going through the
form of a bow.
Found myself in the entry — I hardly
knew how.
On doorstep and sidewalk, past lamp-
post and square.
At home and up stairs, in my owu
easy-chair;
704
BTROM.
Poked my feet into slippers, my
fire into blaze.
And said to myself, as I lit my
cigar,
" Supposing a man bad tbe wealth of
a Czar
Of tbe Russias to boot, for tbe
rest of bis days,
On tbe wbole, do you tbink be would
bave luucb to spare.
If be married a woman witli notliing
to wear '? ' '
John Byrom.
THE WAY A RUMOR IS SPREAD:
OR, THE THREE BLACK CROlVS.
Two bonest tradesmen meeting in
tbe Strand,
One took the other, briskly, by tbe
hand ;
Hark-ye, said be, 'tis an odd story
tliis
About tbe crows! — I don't know
what it is,
Replied bis friend. — No! I'm sur-
prised at that;
Where I came from it is tbe common
chat;
But you shall hear; an odd affair
indeed !
And, that it happened, they are all
agreed :
Not to detain you from a thing so
strange,
A gentleman, tliat lives not far from
Change,
This week, in short, as all the alley
knows.
Taking a puke, has tlirown up three
blac'lc crows, —
Impossible! — Nay, l)ut it's really
true ;
I have it from good hands, and so
may you. —
From whose, I pray ? — So having
named tbe man.
Straight to inquire liis curious com-
rade ran.
Sir, did you tell — relating the af-
fair —
Yes, sir, I did: and if its worth your
care.
Ask Mr. Such-a-one, he told it me
But, by tbe by, 'twas two black
crows, not three. —
Resolved to trace so wondrous an
event.
Whip, to the third, the virtuoso
went;
Sir — and so forth — Why, yes; tbe
thing is fact,
Though in regard to number, not
exact;
It was not two black crows, 'twas
only one,
The truth of that you may depend
upon.
The gentleman himself told me the
case —
Where may I find him? — Why, in
sucli a place.
Away goes lie, and having found
him out.
Sir, be so good as to resolve a doubt.
Then to bis last informant be re-
ferred,
And begged to know, if true what
be had beard?
Did you, sir, throw up a black crow?
—Not I —
Bless me ! bow people propagate a lie !
Black crows have been thrown up,
three, tico, and one;
And here, I find, all comes, at last, to
none!
Did you say nothing of a crow at
all? —
Crow — crow — perhaps I might, now
I recall
The matter over — And, pray, sir,
what was't ?
Why, I was horrid sick, and, at the
last,
I did throw up, and told my neighbor
so.
Something that was — as black, sir,
as a crow.
CARELESS CONTENT.
I AJi content, I do not care,
Wag as it will the world for me ;
When fuss and fret was all my fare,
It got no ground as I could see:
So when away niy caring went,
I counted cost, and was content.
With more of thanks and less of
thought,
I strive to make my matters meet;
To seek what ancient sages sought.
Physic and food in sour and sweet:
To take what passes in good part,
And keep the hiccups from the
heart.
With good and gentle-humored hearts,
I choose to chat where'er I come,
Whate'er the subject be that starts;
But if I get among the glum,
I hold my tongue to tell the truth.
And keep my breath to cool my
broth.
For chance or change of peace or
pain.
For Fortune's favor or her frown,
For lack or glut, for loss or gain,
I never dodge, nor up nor down:
But swing what Avay the shiiJ shall
swim.
Or tack about with equal trim.
If names or notions make a noise,
Wliatever hap the question hath,
The point impartially I poise,
And read or write, but without
wrath ;
For should I burn, or break my
brains.
Pray, who Mill pay me for my
pains ?
I suit not where I shall not speed.
Nor trace the turn of every tide ;
If simple sense will not succeed.
I make no bustling, but abide :
For shining wealth, or scaring woe,
I force no friend, I fear no foe.
Of ups and downs, of ins and outs.
Of they're i' the ^rong, and we're
i' the right,
I shun the rancors and the routs ;
And wishing well to every wight.
Whatever turn the matter takes,
I deem it all but ducks and drakes.
With whom I feast I do not fawn.
Nor if the folks should tlout me,
faint:
If wonted welcome be withdrawn,
I cook no kind of a complaint:
With none disposed to disagree.
But like them best who best like
me.
Not that I rate myself the rule
How all my betters should be-
have ;
But fame shall find me no man's
fool.
Nor to a set of men a slave :
I love a friendship free and frank,
And hate to hang upon a hank.
Fond of a true and trusty tie,
I never loose where'er I link;
Though if a business budges by,
I talk thereon just as I think;
My word, my work, my heart, my
hand.
Still on a side together stand.
I love my neighbor as myself,
Myself like him too, by his leave ;
Nor to his pleasure, power, or pelf.
Came I to crouch, as I conceive:
Dame Nature doubtless has designed
A man the monarch of his mind.
Now taste and trj' this temper, sirs,
Mood it and brood it in your
breast ;
Or if ye ween, for worldly stirs.
That man does right to mar his
rest.
Let me be deft and debonair,
1 am content, I do not care.
706
BYRON.
SPECTACLES, OR HELPS TO READ.
A CERTAIN artist — I've forgot his name —
Had got, for making spectacles, a fame,
Or " lielps to read," as, wlien they first were sold.
Was writ npon his glaring sign in gold ;
And, for all uses to be had from glass.
His were allowed by readers to snrpass.
There came a man into his shop one day —
" Are you the spectacle contriver, pray ? "
" Yes, sir," said he; " I can in that affair
Contrive to please you, if you want a pair."
" Can you ? pray do then." So, at first, he chose
To place a youngish pair upon his nose;
And book produced to see how they would fit :
Asked how he liked 'em '? " Like 'em ? not a bit."
" Then, sir, I fancy, if yon please to try.
These in my hand will better suit your eye."
" No, but they don't." " Well, come, sir, if you please,
Here is another sort, we'll e'en try these;
Still somewhat more they magnify the letter;
Now, sir '? " " Why, now — I'm not a bit the better."
" No ? here, take these, that magnify still more;
How do tliey fit ? " " Like all the rest before."
In short they tried a whole assortment through.
But all in vain, for none of 'em would do.
The operator, much surprised to find
So odd a case, thought, sure the man is blind!
" What sort of eyes can you have got ? " said he.
" Why, very good ones, friend, as you may see."
" Yes, I perceive the clearness of the ball —
Pray, let me ask you, can you read at all ?"
"No, you great blockhead; if I could, what need
Of paying you for any ' helps to read ?' "
And so he left the maker in a heat,
Eesolved to post him for an arrant cheat.
Lord Byron.
[From English Bards and Scotch Ee-
riewers.]
CRITICS.
Oh! nature's noblest gift — my
gray goose-quill I
Slave of my thoughts, obedient to my
will,
Torn from thy parent bird to form a
pen,
That mighty instrument of little
men !
The pen ! foredoomed to aid the men-
tal throes
Of brains that labor, big with verse
or prose,
CAMPBELL.
707
Though nymphs forsake, and critics
may deride,
The lover's solace and the author's
pride.
What wits, what poets, dost thou
daily raise!
How frequent is thy use, how small
thy praise!
Condemned at length to be forgotten
quite,
With all the pages which 'twas thine
to write.
Laugh when I laugh, I seek no other
fame;
The cry is up, and scribblers are my
game.
Speed, Pegasus I — ye strains of great
and small.
Ode, epic, elegy, have at you all !
I, too, can scrawl, and once upon a
a time
I poured along the town a flood of
rhyme,
A schoolboy freak, unworthy praise
or blame;
I printed — older children do the
same.
'Tis pleasant, sure, to see one's name
in print;
A book's a book, although there's
nothing in't.
A man must serve his time to every
trade
Save censure — critics all are ready
made.
Take hackneyed jokes from Miller.
got by rote.
With just enough of learning to mis-
quote :
A mind well skilled to fuid or forge a
fault ;
A turn for punning, — call it Attic
salt ;
To Jeffrey go ; be silent and discreet,
His pay is "just ten sterling pounds
per sheet.
Fear not to lie, 'twill seem a lucky
hit:
Shrink not from blasphemy, 'twill
pass for wit;
Care not for feeling — pass your
proper jest.
And stand a critic, hated, yet ca-
ressed.
And shall we own such judgment ?
No — as soon
Seek roses in December — ice in
June;
Hope constancy in wind, or corn in
chaff;
Believe a woman, or an epitaph.
Or any other thing that's false, before
You trust in critics, who themselves
are sore.
Thomas Campbell.
SOXG.
To T.ove in mv heart, I exclaimed, t'other morning.
Thou hast dwelt here too long, little lodger, take warning
Thou Shalt tempt me no more from my life's sober duty.
To go gadding, bewitched by the young eyes of beauty.
For weary's the wooing, ah! weary,
When an old man willhave a young dearie.
The god left my heart, at its surly reflections.
But came back" on pretext of some sweet recollections,
And he made me forget what I ought to remember,
That the rosebud of Jmie cannot bloom in November.
Ah! Tom, 'tis all o'er with thy gay days —
Write psalms, and not songs for the ladies.
CANNING.
But time's been so far from my wisdom enriching.
That the longer I live, beauty seems more bewitching;
And the only new lore my experience traces,
Is to find fresli enchantment in magical faces.
How weary is wisdom, how weary!
When one sits by a smiling young dearie!
And should slie be wroth that my homage pursues her,
I will turn and retort on my lovely aceuser:
Who's to blame, that my heart by your image is haunted ?
It is you, the enchantress — not I, the enclianted.
Would you liave me behave more discreetly,
Beauty, looli not so killingly sweetly.
TO A YOUNG LADY,
WHO ASKED ME TO WRITE SOMETHING ORIGINAL FOR HER ALBUM.
An original something, fair maid, you would win me
To write — but how shall I begin ?
For I fear I have nothing original in me —
Excepting Original Sin !
George Canning.
THE UNIVERSITY OF GOTTINGEN.
Whene'er with haggard eyes I view
This dungeon that I'm rotting in,
I think of those companions true
Who studied with me at tlie U-
niversity of Gottingen,
niversity of Gottingen.
Sweet kerchief, checked witli heaven-
blue.
Which once my love sat knotting
in —
Alas, Matilda then was true!
At least I thought so at the U-
niversity of Gottingen,
niversity of Gottingen.
Barbs! barbs! alas! how swift you
flew,
Her neat post-wagon trotting in !
Ye bore Matilda from my view ;
Forlorn I languished at the U-
niversity of Gottingen,
niversity of Gottingen.
This faded form! this pallid hue!
This blood my veins is clotting
in!
My years are many — they were few
When first I entered at the U-
niversity of Gottingen,
niversity of Gottingen.
There first for thee my passion
grew,
Sweet, sweet Matilda Pottingen I
Thou wast the daughter of my tu-
tor, law ijrofessor at the U-
niversity of (gottingen,
niversity of Gottingen.
Sun, moon, and thou, vain world,
adieu,
That kings and priests are plotting
in;
Here doomed to starve on water gru-
el, never shall I see the U-
niversity of Gottingen.
niversity of Gottingen,
CARL ETON.
709
Will Carleton.
THE NEW- YEAR'S BABY.
" Th'art welcome, litle bonnie bird.
But shouliln't }ia' come just when tha' flid.
Teimes are bad." — Old EngHsh Ballad.
Hoot, ye little rascal! ye come it on me tliis way
Crowdin' yerself amongst us this blusterin' winter's day
Knowin' tliat we already have three of ye, and seven,
An' tryin' to malce yerself out a New- Year's present o' heaven!
Ten of ye have we now, sir, for this world to abuse,
An' Bobbie he have no waistcoat,- and Nellie she have no shoes-
And Sanimie he have no shirt, sir (I tell it to his shame) ; '
And the one that was just before you we a' n't had time to name.
An' all the banks be smashin', an' on us poor folks fall;
An' boss he whittles the wages when work's to be had at all;
An' Tom he have cut his foot off, an' lies in a woful plight;
An' all of us wonders at mornin' as what we shall eat at night.
An' but for your father an' Sandy a-findin' somew'at to do.
An' but foi-the preacher's woman, who often helps us through,
An' but for your poor, dear mother a-doin' twice her part,
Ye"d 'a' seen us all in heaven afore ye was ready to start.
An' now ye have come, ye rascal ! so healthy an' fat an' sound
A weighin', I'll wager a dollar, the full of a dozen pound;
^Vith your mother's eyes a-flashin', yer father's flesh an' build,
An' a good big mouth an' stomach all ready to be filled.
No, no, don't cry, my baby; hush up, my pretty one.
Don't get my chaff in yer eye, my boy; I only was just in fun.
Ye 11 like us when ye know us, although we're cur'ous folks -
But we don't get much victual, and half our livin' is jokes. '
Why, boy! did ye take me in earnest ? Come, sit upon my knee
I 11 tell ye a secret, youngster; I'll name ye after me;
Ye^shall have all yer brothers an' sisters with ye to play;
An' ye shall have yer carriage, an' ride out every day.
Why, boy, do ye think ye'll suffer ? I'm gettin' a trifle old.
But it'll be many years yet before I lose my hold;
An' if I should fall on the road, boy, still them's'yer brothers there
An not a rogue of 'em ever would see ye harmed a hair.
Say, when ye come from heaven, my little namesake dear
Did ye see, 'inongst the little girls there, a face like this one here^
Ihat was yer little sister; she died a year ago.
An' all of us cried like babies when they laid her under the snow.
Hang it! if all the rich men I ever see or knew
Came here Mitli all their traps, lioy, an' offered 'em for you,
Id show 'em to the door, sir, so quick they'd think it odd,
Before I'd sell to another my New- Year's gift from God
710
COLERIDGE.
Samuel Taylor Coleridge.
FROM "LIXES COMPOSED IX A
coxcEUT room:'
Xoii cold nor stern, my soul! yet I
detest
These scented rooms, where to a
gaudy throng,
Heaves the proud harlot her dis-
tended hreast
In intricacies of laborious song.
These feel not Music's genuine power,
nor deign
To melt at Nature's passion-war-
bled plaint;
But when the long-breathed singer's
uptrilled strain
Bursts in a squall — they gape for
wonderment.
NAMES.
I ASKED my fair, one happy day.
What I should call her in my lay ;
By what sweet name from Rome
or Greece :
Lalage, Netera, Chloris,
Sappho, Lesbia. or Doris,
Arethusa, or Lucrece.
" Ah! " replied my gentle fair,
" Beloved, what are names but air ?
Choose thou whatever suitsthe line ;
Call me Sappho, call me Chloris.
Call me Lalage or Doris,
Only, only call me Thine."
LIXES TO A COMIC AUTHOR OX
AX ABUSIVE REVIEW.
What though the chilly wide-
mouthed quacking chorus
From the rank swamps of nuirk Re-
view-land croak ;
So was it, neighbor, in the times be-
fore us,
When Momus, thro^\ing on his attic
cloak.
Romped with the Graces; and each
tickled Muse
(That Turk, Dan Phoebus, whom
bards call divine.
Was married to — at least, he kept —
* all nine)
Fled, but still with reverted faces ran;
Yet, somewhat the broad freedoms to
excuse,
They had allured the audacious Greek
to use.
Swore they mistook him for their own
good man.
This Monuis — Aristophanes on earth
Men called him — maugre all his wit
and woi'th
Was croaked and gabbled at. How,
then, should you.
Or I, friend, hope to 'scape the skulk-
ing crew '?
No! laugh, and say aloud, in tones
of glee,
" I hate the quacking tribe, and they
hate me! "
FROM "AX ODE TO THE RAIX."
Composed before daylight, on the morning ap-
pointed for the departure of a very worthy,
but not very pleasant visitor, whom it was
feared the rain might detain.
Though you should come again to-
morrow.
And bring with you l)oth pain and
sorro\v ;
Though stomach should sicken and
knees shotdd swell —
I'll nothing speak of you but well.
But only now for this one day.
Do go, dear Rain! do go away!
Dear Rain ! I ne'er refused to say
You're a good creature in your way;
Nay, I would Mrite a book myself,
Would fit a parson's lower shelf.
Showing how very good you are.
What then '? sometimes it must be
fair!
And if sometimes, why not to-day ?
Do go, dear Rain ! do go away !
COWPER,
Dear Rain! if I've been cold and
sliy,
Take no offence! I'll tell you whj-.
A dear old friend e'en now is here,
And with him came my sister dear;
After long absence now tirst met,
Long months by pain and grief be-
set —
With three dear friends! in truth we
groan —
Impatiently to be alone.
We three, you mai'k! and not one
more !
The strong wish makes my spirit sore.
We have so much to talk about,
So many sad things to let out;
So many tears in our eye-corners,
Sitting like little Jacky Horners —
In short, as soon as it is day.
Do go, dear Kain ! do go away !
EPIGRAM ON " THE RIME OF
THE ANCIENT MARINER "
Your poem must eternal be,
Dear sir; it cannot fail;
For, 'tis incomprehensible.
And without head or tail.
William Cowper.
JOHN GILPIN.
JoHX Gilpin was a citizen
Of credit and renov.n,
A train-band captain eke was he
Of famous London town.
John Gilpin's spouse said to her
dear —
" Though wedded we have been
These twice ten tedious years, yet we
No holiday have seen.
To-morrow is our wedding-day,
And we will then repair
Unto the Bell at Edmonton
All in a chaise and pair.
My sister and my sister's child,
Myself and children three.
Will till the chaise; so you must ride
On horselmck after we."
lie soon replied — "I do admire
Of womankind but one.
And you are she, my dearest dear,
Therefore it shall be done.
I am a linen-drav)er bold.
As all the world doth know.
And my good friend the calender
Will lend his horse to go."
Quoth Mrs. Gilpin ~ " That's well
said ;
And for that wine is dear,
We will be furnished with our own,
Which is both bright and clear.".
John Gilpin kissed his loving wife,
O'erjoyed was he to find [bent,
That, though on pleasure she was
She had a frugal mind.
The morning came, the chaise was
brought.
But yet was not allowed
To drive up to the door, lest all
Should say that she was proud.
So three doors off the chaise was
stayed.
Where they did all get in;
Six precious souls, and all agog
To dash through thick and thin.
Smack went the whii), round went
the wheels.
Were never folks so gl.ad.
The stones did rattle underneath,
As if Cheapside were mad.
John Gilpin at his horse's side
Seized fast the flowing mane,
And up he got, in haste to ride.
But soon came down again;
w
«
712 COWPER.
i
For saddle-tree scarce reached bad he,
So stooping down, as needs he must
His journey to begin,
Who cannot sit upright,
When, turning round his head, lie
He grasped the mane with both his
saw
hands,
Three customers come in.
And eke with all his might.
So down be came ; for loss of time,
His horse, who never in that sort
Although it grieved him sore,
Had handled been before.
Yet loss of pence, full well he know,
What thing upon his back had got
Would trouble him much more.
Did wonder more and more.
'Twas long before the customers
Away went Gilpin, neck or nought;
Were suited to their mind.
Away went hat and wig;
When Betty screaming came down
He little dreamt, when he set out,
stairs,
Of running such a rig.
" The wine is left behind !"
The wind did blow, the cloak did fly,
" Good lack! " quoth he; " yet bring
Like streamer long and gay.
it me.
Till, loop and Initton failing both,
My leathern belt likewise.
At last it flew away.
In wliich I bear my trusty sword
When 1 do exercise."
Then might all people well discern
The bottles he had slung ;
Now Mrs. Gilpin (careful soul)
A bottle swinging at each side.
Had two stone bottles found.
As hath been said or sung.
To hold the liquor that she loved.
And keep it safe and sound.
The dogs did bark, the children
screamed.
Each bottle had a curling ear.
Up flew the windows all ;
Through which the belt he drew,
And every soul cried out, "Well
And hung a bottle on each side.
done ! ' '
To make his balance true.
As loud as he could bawl.
Then over all. that he might be
Away went Gilpin — v,-ho but he?
Equipped from top to toe.
His fame soon spread around —
His long red cloak, well brushed and
" He carries weight! he rides a race!
neat,
'Tis for a thousand pound ! "
He manfully did throw.
And still, as fast as he drew near.
Now see him mounted once again
'Twas wonderful to view
Upon his nimble steed,
How in a trice the turnpike-men
Full slowly pacing o'er the stones
Their gates wide open threw.
With caution and good heed.
And now. as he went bowing down
But finding soon a smoother road
His reeking head full low.
Beneath his well-shod feet.
The bottles twain behind his back
The snorting l)east began to trot.
AYere shattered at a blo\\'.
Which galled him in bis seat.
Down ran the wine into the road.
So "Fair and softly," .lohn he cried;
Most piteous to be seen.
But John he cried in vain;
Which made his horse's flanks to
That trot became a gallop soon,
smoke
^
In spite of curb and rein.
As they had basted been.
COV/PEB.
713
But still he seemed to carry weight,
With leathern girdle braced;
For all might see the bottle-necks
Still dangling at his waist.
Thus all through merry Islington
These gambols did he play,
Until he came unto the Wash
Of Edmonton so gay;
And tliere he threw the wash about
On both sides of the way,
Just like unto a trundling mop,
Or a wild goose at play.
At Edmonton his loving wife
From the balcony spied
Her tender husband, wondering much
To see how he did ride.
"Stop, stop, John Gilpin! — Here's
the house," —
They all aloud did cry;
"The dinner waits, and we are
tired: "
Said Gilpin — " So am I."
But yet his horse was not a whit
Inclined to tarry there;
For why ? — His owner had a house
Full ten miles otf at Ware.
So like an arrow swift lie flew.
Shot by an archer strong;
So did he fly — which brings me to
The middle of my song.
Away went Gilpin out of breath,
And sore aiiainst his will.
Till at his friend's the calender's
His horse at last stood still.
The calender, amazed to see
His neighbor in such trim.
Laid down his pipe, flew to the gate,
And thus accosted him :
" What news ? what news ? your
tidings tell.
Tell me you nmst and shall ;
Say why bare-headed you are come,
Or why you come at all ?"
Xow Gilpin had a pleasant wit,
And loved a timely joke;
And thus unto the calender
In merry guise he spoke : —
" I came because your horse would
come.
And, if I well forbode.
My hat and wig will soon be here —
They are upon the road."
The calender, right glad to find
His friend in merry pin.
Returned him not a single word.
But to the house went in.
Whence straight he came with hat
and wig —
A wig tliat flowed behind,
A hat not much the worse for wear,
Each comely in its kind.
He held them up, and in his turn
Thus showed his ready wit;
" My head is twice as big as yours,
They therefore needs must fit.
But let me scrape the dirt away
That liangs upon your face;
And stop and eat, for well you may
Be in a hungry case."
Said John — " It is my wedding-day,
And ail the world would stare
If wife should dine at Edmonton,
And I sliould dine at Ware."
So, turning to his horse, he said,
" I am in haste to dine;
'Twas for your pleasure you came
here.
You shall go back for mine."
Ah! luckless speech, and bootless
boast !
For which he paid full dear;
For while he spake, a braying ass
Did sing most loud and clear;
Whereat his horse did snort, as he
Had heard a lion roar.
And galloped off with all his might,
As he had done before.
714
COW PER.
Away went Gilpin, and^way
Now let us sing, Long live the king,
Went Gilpin's hat and wig:
And Gilpin, long live he;
He lost them sooner than at first;
And when he next doth ride abroad,
For why "? — They were too big.
May I be there to see I
Now Mistress Gilpin, when she saw
Her hnsband posting down
Into the country far away.
[From Conversation.]
She pulled out half a crown ;
THE TONGUE.
And thus unto the youth she said
WoKDS learned by rote, a parrot
That drove them to the liell,
may rehearse.
" This shall be yours when you bring
But talking is not always to converse;
back
Not more distinct from harmony di-
My husband safe and well."
vine
The constant creaking of a country
The youth did ride, and soon did meet
sign.
John coming back amain,
As alphabets in ivory employ
Whom in a trice he tried to stop,
Hour after hour the yet unlettered
By catching at his rein:
boy,
Sorting and puzzling with a deal of
But not performing what he meant.
glee
And gladly would have done,
Those seeds of science called his
The frightetl steed he frighted more,
ABC;
And made him faster run.
So language in the mouth of the
adult,
Away went Gilpin, and away
(Witness its insignificant result,)
Went post-boy at his heels.
Too often proves an implement of
The post-boy's horse right glad to
play.
miss
A toy to sport Viith, and pass time
The lumbering of the wheels.
away.
Collect at evening what the day
Six gentlemen upon the road
brought forth.
Thus seeing Gilpin fly.
Compress the sum into its solid worth.
With post-boy scamijering in the
And if it weigh the importance of a
rear.
fly,
They raised the hue and cry :
The scales are false, or algebra a lie.
" Stop thief ! stop thief ! — a highway-
man! "
Not one of them was mute ;
[From Conversation.]
And all and each that passed that
way
Did join in the pursuit.
THE UXCERTAIX MAX.
DuBius is such a scrupulous good
And now the turnpike-gates again
nitiii —
Yes, you may ca,tch him tripping —
Flew open in short space;
if you can.
The tollmen thinking as before
He would not with a peremptory
That Gilpin rode a race.
tone
Assei't the nose upon his face his
And so he did ; and won it too ;
own :
For he got first to town ;
With hesitation admirably slow.
Nor stopped till where he had got up
He humbly hopes — presimies — it
He did again get down.
may be so.
COWPEB.
715
His evidence, if he were called by
law
To swear to some enormity he srav,
For want of prominence and just re-
lief,
Would hang an honest man and save
a thief.
Through constant dread of giving
truth offence,
He ties up all his liearers in suspense:
Knows what he knows as if he knew
it not;
What he remembers seems to have
forgot ;
His sole opinion, whatsoe'er befall.
Centring at last in having none at
afl.
[From Conversation .'[
THE EMPHATIC TALKER.
The emphatic speaker dearly loves
to 0])pose,
In contact inconvenient, nose to nose.
As if the gnomon on his neighbor's
phiz.
Touched with the magnet, had at-
tracted his.
His whispered theme, dilated and at
large,
Proves after all a windgun's airy
charge —
An extract of his diary, — no more, —
A tasteless journey of the day before.
He walked abroad, overtaken in the
rain,
Called on a friend, drank tea, stepped
home again,
Resumed his purpose, had a world of
talk
With one he stumbled on, and lost
his walk.
I interrupt him with a sudden bow,
"Adieu, dear sir I lest you should
lose it now."
[From Conversation.]
DESCANTING ON ILLNESS.
Some men employ their health, an
ugly trick,
In making known how oft they have
been sick.
And give us in recitals of disease,
A doctor's trouble, but without the
fees;
Relate how many weeks they kept
their bed.
How an emetic or cathartic sped :
Nothing is slightly touched, much
less forgot.
Nose, ears, and eyes seem present on
the spot.
Now the distemper, spite of draught
or pill,
Victorious seemed, and now the doc-
tors skill;
And now — alas, for unforeseen mis-
haps !
They put on a damp nightcap and
relapse :
They thought they must have died,
they were so bad ;
Their peevish hearers almost wish
they had.
[From Conversation.]
A FAITHFUL PICTURE OF ORDI-
NARY SOCIETY.
The circle formed, we sit in silent
state.
Like figures drawn upon a dial-plate;
'' Yes, ma'am," and "No, ma'am,"
uttered softly, show
Every five minutes how the minutes
go;
Each individual, suffering a con-
straint —
Poetry may, but colors cannot,
paint, —
As if in close committee on the sky,
Reports it hot or cold, or wet or
dry.
And finds a changing clime a happy
source
Of wise reflection and well-timed
discourse.
We next inquire, but softly and by
stealth.
Like conservators of the public
health.
Of epidemic throats, if sitch there are
Of coughs and rheums, and phthisic
and catarrh.
That theme exhausted, a wide chasm
ensues,
Filled up at last with interesting
news.
Who danced with whom, and who
are like to wed ;
And who is hanged, and M'ho is
brought to bed;
But fear to call a more important
cause,
As if 'twere treason against English
laws.
The visit paid, with ecstasy we come.
As from a seven years' transportation,
home.
And there resume an unembarrassed
brow,
Recovering what we lost we know
not how,
The faculties that seemed reduced to
nought.
Expression and the privilege of
thouiiht.
(From Conversation.']
THE CAPTIOUS.
Some fretful tempers wince at every
touch,
You always do too little or too much :
You speak with life in hopes to en-
tertain.
Your elevated voice goes through the
brain ;
You fall at once into a lower key.
That's worse — the drone-pipe of an
humble-bee.
The southern sash admits too strong
a light,
You rise and drop the curtain — now
'tis night.
He shakes with cold, you stir the tire
and strive
To make a blaze — that's roasting
him alive.
Serve him with venison, and he
chooses fish ;
With sole — that's just the sort he
wovdd not wish.
He takes what he at first professed to
loatlie.
And in due time feeds heartily on
both.
PAIRING-TIME ANTICIPATED.
A FABLE.
I SHALL not ask Jean Jacques Rous-
seau
If birds confabulate or no;
'Tis clear that they were always able
To hold discourse, at least in fable;
And even the child who knows no
better
Than to interpret by the letter,
A story of a cock and bidl
Must have a most uncommon skull.
it chanced then on a winter's rlinear days of frugal hash:
Wine hadst thou seldom; wilt thou
be so vain
As to decide on claret or champagne ?
Dost thou from me derive this taste
sublime,
Who order port the dozen at a time ?
When (every glass held precious in
our eyes)
AVe judged the value by the bottle's
size: [sume,
Then never merit for thy praise as-
Its worth well knows each servant in
the room.
GRANCH.
719
[From The Patron.']
THE YOUNG POET'S VISIT TO
THE HALL.
And now arriving at the Hall, he
tried
For air composed, serene and satis-
fied;
As he had practised in his room alone,
And there acquired a free and easy
tone;
There he had said, "Whatever the
degree
A man obtains, what more than man
is he ■? " '
And when arrived — " This room is
but a room,
Can aught we see the steady sold
o'ercome ?
Let me in all a manly firmness
show,
Upheld by talents, and their vakie
know."
This reason urged; but it surpassed
his skill
To be in act as manly as in will ;
When he his lordship and the lady
saw.
Brave as he was, he felt oppressed
with awe ;
And spite of verse, that so much
praise had won,
The poet found he was the bailiff's
son.
But dinner came, and the succeed-
ing hours
Fixed his weak nerves, and raised his
failing powers :
Praised and assured, he ventured once
or twice
On some remark, and bravely broke
the ice;
So that at night, reflecting on his
words.
He found, in time, he might con-
verse with lords.
Christopher Pearse Cranch.
SHELLING PEAS.
No, Tom. yon may banter as much as you please;
But it's all the result of the shellin' them peas.
Why, I had n't the slightest idee, do you know,
That so serious a matter would out of it grow.
I tell you v\hat, Tom, I do feel kind o' scared.
I dreamed it, I hoped it, but never once dared
To breathe it to her. And besides, 1 nuist say
I always half fancied she fancied Jim Wray,
So I felt kind o' stuffy and proud, and took care
To be out of the way when that feller was there
A danglin' around; for thinks I, if it's him
That Katy likes best, what's the use lookin' grim
At Katy or Jim, — for it's all up with me;
And I'd better jest let 'em alone, do you see ?
But you would n't have thought it; that girl never keered
The snap of a pea-pod for Jim's bushy beard.
Well, here's how it was. I was takin' some berries
Across near her garden to leave at Aunt Mary's;
When, jest as I come to the old ellum-tree.
All alone in the shade, that June mornin', was she —
Shellin' peas — setting there on a garden settee.
I swan, she was handsomer 'n ever I seen.
Like a rose all alone in a moss-work o' green.
GRANGE.
Well, there wasn't no nse; so, says I, I'll jest linger
And gaze at her here, hid behind a syringa.
But she heard me a movin', and looked a bit frightened,
So I come and stood near her. I fancied she brightened,
And seemed sort o' pleased. So I hoped she was well ;
And — would she allow me to help her to shell ?
For she sot with a monstrous big dish full of peas
Jest fresh from the vines, which she held on her knees.
" May I help you. Miss Katy ? " says I. " As you please,
Mr. Baxter," says she. " But you're busy, I guess " —
Glancin' down at my berries, and then at her dress.
" Not the least. There's no hurry. It ain't very late;
And I'd rather be here, and Aunt Maiy can wait."
So I sot down beside her; an' as nobody seen us,
1 jest took the dish, and I held it between us.
And I thought to myself I must make an endeavor
To know wiiich she likes, Jim or me, now or never!
But I couldn't say nothin'. We sot there and held
That green pile between us. She shelled, and I shelled;
AnApop went the pods; and I couldn't help thinkin'
Of popping the question. A kind of a sinkin'
Come over my spirits; till at last I got out,
'• Mister Wray's an admirer of yours, I've no doubt
You see him quite often." " Well, sometimes. But why
And what if I did ?" " O, well, nothin'," says I.
" Some folks says you're goin' to marry him, tliough."
" Who says so ? " says she; and she flared up like tow
When you throw in a match. " Well, some folks that I know."
" 'T ahi't true, sir," says she. And she snapped a big pod,
Till the peas, right and left, flew all over the sod.
Then I looked in her eyes, but she only looked down
With a blush she tried to chase off with a frown.
" Then it's somebody else you like better," says I.
" No, it ain't though." says she; and I thought she would cry.
Then I tried to say somethin' ; it stuck in my throat.
And all my idees were upset and afloat.
But I said I knew somebody 'd loved her so long —
Though he never had told her — with feelin's so strong
He was ready to die at her feet, if she chosed.
If she only could love him! — I hardly supposed
That she cared for him much, though. And so Tom, — and so, —
For I thought that I saw how the matter would go, —
With my heart all a jumpin' with fapture, I found
I had taken her hand, and my arm was around
Her waist ere I knew it, and she witli her head
On my shoulder, — but no, I won't tell what she said.
The birds sang above us; our secret was theirs;
The leaves whispered soft in the wandering airs.
I tell you the world was a new world to me.
I can talk of these things like a book now, you see.
But the peas ? Ah, the peas in the pods were a mess
Rather bigger than those that we shelled, you may guess.
It's risky to set Mith a girl shellin' peas.
You may tease me now, Tom, just as much as you please.
CRANCH.
721
THE DISPUTE OF THE SEVEN DAYS.
Once on a time the days of the week
Quarrelled and made bad weather.
The point was which of the seven
was best;
So they all disputed together.
And Monday said, " I wash the
clothes " ;
And Tuesday said, " I air 'em" ;
And Wednesday said, " I iron the
shirts" ;
And Thursday said, " I wear 'em."
And Friday, " I'm the day for fish " ;
And Saturday, " Children love
me" ;
And Suu,day, "I am the Sabbath
day,
I'm sure there are none above me."
One said, " I am the fittest for
work" ;
And one, " I am fittest for leisure."
Another, "I'm best for prayer and
praise"; [ure."
And auotlier, " I'm best for pleas-
Arguing thus, they flapped their
wings.
And puffed up every featlier;
They blew and rained and snowed
and liailed:
There never was seen such weather.
Old P'ather Time was passing by,
And heard the hurly-burly.
Said he, "Here's something going
wrong ;
It's well I was up so early.
"These children of mine have lost
their wits
And seem to be all non compos.
1 never knew them to gabble thus.
Hollo there! — stop the rumpus!
'* I should think you a flock of angry
geese.
To hear your screaming and bawl-
ing.
Indeed, it would seem by the way it
snows,
Goose-feathers are certainly falling.
"You. Sunday, sir, with your starched
cravat.
Black coat, and church-veneering:
Tell me the cause of this angry spat;
Speak loud, — I am hard of hearing.
" Yon are the foremost talker here;
The wisest sure you should be.
I little thought such a deuce of a row
As you are all making, could be."
Then Simday said, " Good Father
Time,
The case is clear as noonday;
For ever since the world was made.
The Lord's day has been Sunday.
"The church — " Here Monday
started u}):
" The folks are glad when you
leave 'em;
They all want me to give 'em work,
And the pleasures of which you
bereave 'em."
But Tuesday said, " I finish your
chores,
And do them as fine as a fiddle."
And Wednesday, " I am the best of
you all
Because I stand in the middle."
And Thursday, Friday, Saturday,
each
Said things that I can't remember.
And so they might have argued their
case
From March until December.
But Father Tempus cut them short:
" My children, why this pother"?
There is no best, there is no worst;
One day 's just like another.
•• To God's great eye all shine alike
As in their primal beauty.
That day is best whose deeds are best.
That worst that fails in duty.
" Where Justice lights the passing
hours,
Where Love is wise and tender,
There beams the radiance of the skies,
There shines a day of splendor."
LOB SOX— DUYDEN.
Austin Dobson.
MORE POETS YET!
" More poets yetl " — 1 bear him say.
Aiming his heavy hand to slay; —
" Despite my skill and 'swashing blow,'
They seem to sprout where'er I go; —
I killed a host but yesterday ! "
Slash on, O Hercules! You may:
Your task's at best a Hydra-fray;
And though you cut, not less will grow
More poets yet !
Too arrogant ! For who shall stay
The first bliml motions of the May ?
Who shall ontljiot the morning glow.
Or stem the full heart's overflow?
Who ? There will rise, till time decay.
More poets yet !
John Dryden.
[From " Absalom and Achitophel."]
A CHAIiACTEIi.
A -MAN so various that he seemed to
be
Not one, but all mankind's epitome:
Stiff in opinions, always in the
wrong ;
Was everything by starts, and notliing
long;
But, in the course of one revolving
moon.
Was chemist, fiddler, statesman, and
buffoon :
Then all for women, painting, rliym-
ing, drinking.
Besides ten thousand freaks that died
in thinking.
Blest madman, wlio cotild every hour
employ,
With something new to wish, or to
enjoy !
Railing and praising were his usual
themes ;
And both, to show his judgment in
extremes:
So over-violent, or over-civil.
That everv man with liim was God or
Devil.
In squandering wealth was his pecu-
liar art;
Nothing went unrewarded but desert.
Beggared by fools, wliom still he found
too late;
He had his jest, and they had liis
estate.
FROM "THE COCK AND THE FOX."
A FOX, full-fraught Avith seeming
sanctity,
That feared an oath, but, like the
devil, would lie;
Who looked like Lent, and liad the
holy leer.
And durst not sin before he said his
prayer;.
DBYDEN.
723
This pious cheat, that never sucked
the blood.
Nor chewed the flesli of lambs, —
but when he could ;
Had passed three summers in the
neighboring wood:
And musing long, whom next to cir-
cumvent.
On Chanticleer his wicked fancy
bent ;
And in liis high imagination cast,
By stratagem to gratify his taste.
The plot contrived, before the break
of day.
Saint Reynard through the hedge had
made his way ;
The pale was next, but proudly with
a bound
He leapt the fence of the forbidden
ground :
Yet fearing to be seen, within a bed
Of coleworts he concealed his wily
head ;
Then skuilced t 11 afternoon, and
watched bio time,
{As murderers use) to perj^etrate his
crime.
The rock, that of his flesh Avas ever
free.
Sung merrier than the mermaid in the
sea:
And so befell, that as he cast his eye
Among the coleworts on a butterfly.
He saw false Keynard where he lav
full low:
I need not swear he had no list to
crow :
But cried, cock, cock, and gave a sud-
den start,
As sore dismayed and frighted at his
heart.
For birds and beasts, informed by
Nature, know
Kinds opposite to theirs, and fly their
foe.
So Chanticleer, who never saw a
fox.
Yet slumii'd him as a sailor shuns the
rocks.
But the false loon, who could not
work his will
By open force, employed his flattering
skill ;
I hope, my lord, said he, I not offend ;
Are you afraid of me, that am your
friend ?
I were a beast indeed to do you
wrong,
I, who have loved and honored you so
long:
Stay, gentle sir, nor take a false
alarm.
For on my soul I never meant you
harm.
I come no spy, nor as a traitor press.
To learn the secrets of your soft re-
cess :
Far be from Reynard so profane a
thought.
But by the sweetness of your voice
was brought :
For, as I bid my beads, by chance I
heard
The song as of an angel in the yard ;
My lord, your sire familiarly I
knew,
A peer deserving such a son as you:
He, with your lady-mother, (whom
Heaven rest)
Has often graced my house, and been
my guest :
To view his living features does me
good,
For I am your poor neighbor in the
wood ;
And in my cottage shoidd be proud
to see
The worthy heir of my friend's
family.
But since I speak of singing, let
me say.
As with an upright heart I safely
may,
That, save yourself, there breathes
not on the ground
One lilve your father for a silver-
sound. I day.
So sweetly would he wake the winter-
That matrons to the church mistook
their way.
And thought they heard the merry
organ play.
And he to raise his voice with artful
care,
(What will not beaux attempt to
please the fair ?)
724
DRY DEN.
On tiptoe stood to sing with greater
strength,
And stretch'd his comely neck at all
the length :
And while he strained his voice to
pierce the skies,
As saints in raptures use, would shut
his eyes.
That the sound striving through the
narrow throat.
His winking might avail to mend the
note.
The cock was pleased to hear him
speak so fair,
And proud beside, as solar people
are;
Nor could the treason from the truth
descry,
►So was he ravish'd with this flattery:
.So much the more, as from a little
elf,
He had a high opinion of himself;
Though sickly, slender, and not large
of limb.
Concluding all the world was made
for him.
This Chanticleer, of whom the
story sings,
Stood high upon his toes, and clapp'd
his wings;
Then stretch'd his neck, and wink'd
with both his eyes.
Ambitious as he sought the Olympic
prize.
But while he pained himself to raise
his note,
False Reynard rushed, and caught
him by the throat.
Then on his back he laid the precious
load,
And sought his wonted shelter of the
wood ;
Swiftly he made his way, the mischief
done.
Of all imheeded, and pursued by
none.
But see how Fortune can confound
the wise.
And when they least expect it, turn
the dice.
The captive cock, who scarce could
draw his breath.
And lay within the very jaws of
death ;
Yet in this agony his fancy wrought,
And fear supplied him with this
happy thought:
Yours is the prize, victorious prince,
said he,
The vicar my defeat, and all the
village see.
Enjoy your friendly fortune while
you may,
And bid the churls that envy you the
pi-ey,
Call back their mongrel curs, and
cease tlieir cry.
See, fools, the shelter of the wood is
nigh.
And Chanticleer in your despite shall
die.
He shall be plucked and eaten to the
bone.
'Tis well advised, in faith it shall
be done ;
This Reynard said: but as the word
lie spoke.
The prisoner with a spring from pris-
on broke:
Then stretch'd his feathered fans with
all his might.
And to the neighboring maple winged
his flight.
Whom when the traitor safe on tree
beheld,
He cursed the gods, with shame and
sorrow filled ;
Shame for his folly, sorrow out of
time.
For plotting an unprofitable crime ;
Yet mastering both, the artificer of
lies
Renews the assault, and his last bat-
tery tries.
Though I, said he, did ne'er In
thought offend.
How justly may my lord suspect his
friend '?
The appearance is against me, I con-
fess.
Who seemingly have put yon in dis-
tress :
This, since you take it ill, I must re-
pent.
Though Heaven can witness, with no
bad intent | cheer
I practised it, to make you taste your
With double pleasure, first prepared
by fear.
Descend! so help me Jove I as you
shall find
That Keynard conies of no dissem-
bling kind.
Nay, quoth the cock ; but I beshrew
us both,
If I believe a saint upon his oath:
An honest man may take a knave's
advice.
But idiots only may be cozened twice:
Once warned is well bewared. Not
flattering lies
Shall soothe me more to sing with
winking eyes.
And open mouth, for fear of catch-
ing flies.
Who blindfold walks upon a river's
brim,
AVhen he should see, has he deserved
to swim ?
Better, Sir Cock, let all contentions
cease,
Come down, said Reynard, let us treat
of peace.
A peace with all my soul, said Chan-
ticleer ;
But, M'ith your favor, I will treat it
here:
And lest the truce with treason should
be mix'd,
'Tis my concern to have the tree be-
twixt. »
John Gay.
THE HARE AND MANY FRIENDS.
Friendship, like love, is but a
name.
Unless to one you stint the flame.
The child, whom many fathers share.
Hath seldom known a father's care.
'Tis thus in friendships; who depend
On many, rarely find a friend.
A hare, who, in a civil way.
Complied with everything, like Gay,
Was known by all the bestial train
Who haunt the wood, or graze the
plain;
Her care was never to offend ;
And every creature was her friend.
As forth she went at early dawn.
To taste the dew-besprinkled lawn,
Behind she hears the hunter's cries.
And from the deep-mouthed thunder
flies.
She starts, she stops, she pants for
breath.
She hears the near advance of death ;
She doubles, to mislead the hound.
And measures back her mazy round ;
Till, fainting in the public way.
Half-dead with fear, she gasping lay.
What transport in her bosom grew
When first the horse appeared in view !
" Let me," says she, " yom' back
ascend.
And owe my safety to a friend.
You know my feet betray my flight:
To friendship every burden 's light."
The horse replied, "Poor honest,
puss,
It grieves my heart to see thee thus:
Be comforted, relief is near,
For all your friends are in the rear."
She next the stately bull implored;
And thus replied the mighty lord:
" Since every beast alive can tell
That I sincerely wish you well,
I may, without offence, pretend
To take the freedom of a friend.
To leave you thus might seem un-
kind;
But, see, the goat is just behind."
The goat remarked, " Her pulse
was high,
Her languid head, her heavy eye:
My back." says he, "may do you
harm ;
The sheep's at hand, and wool is
warm."
726
HALPINE.
The sheep was feeble, ami com-
plained,
" His sides a load of wool sustained;
Said he was slow, confessed his fears ;
For hounds eat sheep as well as
hares."
She now the trotting calf addressed ;
To save from death a friend dis-
tressed.
" Shall I," says he, "of tender age,
In this important care engage ?
Older and abler passed you by;
IIow strong are those! how weak
am I!
Should I presume to bear you hence.
Those friends of mine may take of-
fence.
Excuse me, then ; you know my heart ;
But dearest friends, alas! must part.
How shall we all lament! Adieu;
For see, the hounds are just in view."
THE MOTHER, THE NURSE, AND
THE FAIRY.
" Give me a son." The blessing
sent,
Were ever parents more content ?
How partial are their doting eyes!
No child is half so fair and wise.
AVaked to the morning's pleasing
care.
The mother rose and sought her heir.
She saw the nurse like one possest.
With wringing hands and sobbing
breast.
" Sure, some disaster has befell;
Speak, nurse, I hope the boy is well."
" Dear madam, think not me to
blame ;
Invisible the fairy came:
Your precious babe is hence con-
veyed,
And in the place a changeling laid.
Where are the father's mouth and
nose ?
The mother's eyes, as black as sloes ?
See, here, a shocking awkward crea-
ture.
That speaks a fool in every featm-e."
*' The woman 's blind," the mother
cries,
" I see wit sparkle in his eyes."
" Lord, madam, what a squinting
leer !
Xo doubt the fairy hath been here."
Just as she spoke, a prying sprite
Pops through the keyhole swift as
light;
Perched on the cradle's top he stands,
And thus her folly reprimands:
"Whence sprung the vain, con-
ceited lie.
That we with fools the world supply ?
What! give our sprightly race away
For the dull, helpless sons of clay!
Besides, by partial fondness shown,
Like you, we dote upon our own.
When yet was ever found a motlier
Who'd give her booby for another '?
And should we change with human
breed,
Well might we pass for fools indeed."
Charles Graham Halpine (Miles O'Reilly).
QUAKEUDOM,- A FORMAL CALL.
Through her forced, abnormal
quiet
Flashed the soul of frolic riot.
And a most malicious laughter lighted
up her downcast eyes ;
All in vain I tried each topic.
Ranged from polar climes to tropic,
Every conunonplace I started met
with yes-or-uo replies.
For her mother — stiff and stately.
As if starched and ironed lately —
Sat erect, with rigid elbows bedded
thus in curving palms;
There she sat on guard before
us,
And in words precise, decorous.
And most calm, reviewed the weather,
and recited several psalms.
HARTE.
727
How without abruptly ending
Tliis my visit, and otfendiug
Wealtliy iieiglibors, was the prol)leni
which employed my mental
care ;
When the butler, bowing lowly,
Uttered clearly, stiffly, slowly,
" Madam, please, the gardener wants
you," — Heaven, I thought,
has heard my prayer.
" Pardon me!" shegrandly uttered;
Bowing low. I gladly muttered,
"Siu-ely, Madam!" and, relieved I
turned to scan the daughter's
face :
Ha! what pent-up mirth outflashes
From beneath those pencilled
lashes !
How the drill of Quaker custom yields
to Nature's brilliant grace.
Brightly springs the prisoned foun-
■^tain [tain
From the side of Delphi's moun-
When the stone that weighed upon its
buoyant life is thrust aside ;
So the long-enforced stagnation
Of the maiden's conversation
Now imparted fivefold brilliance to
its ever-varying tide.
Widely ranging, quickly changing,
Witty, winning, from beginning
Unto enil 1 listened, merely flinging
in a casual word ;
Eloquent, and yet how sunple!
Hand and eye, and eddying dimi)le,
Tongue and lip together made a
music seen as well as heard.
When the noonday woods are ring-
ing* . .
All the birds of summer singing,
Suddenly there falls a silence, and we
know a serpent nigh :
So upon the door a rattle
Stopped our animated tattle.
And the stately mother found us prim
enough to suit her eye.
Bret Harte.
DOW'S FLAT.
Dow''!^ Flat. That's its name.
And I reckon that you
Are a stranger ? The same ?
Well, I thought it was true,
For thar isn't a man on the river as can't spot the place at first view.
It was called after Dow, —
Which the same was an ass ;
And as to the how
Thet the thing kem to pass, —
Just tie up your hoss to tliat buckeye, and sit ye down here in the grass.
You see this yer Dow
Hed the worst kind of luck;
He slipped up someliow
On each thing thet he struck.
Why, pf he'd a' straddled that fence-rail the derned thing 'ed get up and
buck.
72»
HAUTE.
He mined on the bat-
Till he couldn't pay rates;
He was smaslied by a car
When he tunnelled with Bates;
And right on the top of his trouble keni his wife and five kids from the
States.
It was rough, — mighty rough;
But the boys they stood by,
And they brought him the stuff
For a house, on the sly ;
x\.nd the old woman, — well, she did washing, and took on when no one
was nigh.
But this yer luck of Dow's
Was so powerful mean
That tlie spring near his liouse
Drieu right up on the green ;
And he sunk forty feet down for water, but nary a drop to be seen.
Then the bar petered out,
And the boys wouldn't stay;
And the chills got about.
And his wife fell away ;
But Dow. in his well, kept a peggin' in his usual ridikilous way.
One day, — it was June, —
And a year ago, jest, —
This Dow kem at noon
To his work like the rest.
With a sliovel and pick on Ins shoulder, and a derringer hid in his breast.
He goes to the well.
And he stands on the brink.
And stops for a spell
Jest to listen and think:
For the sun in his eyes (jest like this, sir !), you sec, kinder made the cuss
bluik.
His two ragged gals
In the gulch were at play.
And a gownd that was Sal's
Kinder flapped on a bay :
Not much for a man to be leavln', but his all, — as I've hecr'd the folks say.
And — that's a peart hoss
Thet you've got — ain't it now ?
What might be her cost ?
Eh '? Oil !— Well then, Dow —
Let's see, —well, that forty-foot grave wasn't his, sir, that day, anyhow.
For a blow of his pick
Sorter caved in the side.
And he looked and turned sick,
Then he trembled and cried ;
For you see the dern cuss liad struck — " Water ?" — Beg your parding,
young man, there you lied !
HARTE.
729
It was (jold, — in the quartz,
And it ran all alike;
And 1 reckon live oughts
Was the worth of that strike;
And that house with the coopilow's his'n, — which the same isn't bad for
a Pike.
Thet's why it's Dow' s Hat;
And the thing of it is
That he kinder got that
Through sheer contrairiness:
For 'twas icater the derned ciiss was seekin', and his luck made him certain
to miss.
Thet's so. Thar's your way
To the left of yon tree ;
But — a — look h'yur, say.
Won't you come up to tea ?
No? Well, then the ne.\t time you're passin' ; and ask after Dow, — and
thet's nte.
PLAIN LAXGUAGE FIIOM TRUTH-
FUL JAMES.
POPULAULY KNOWN AS THE
CHINEE."
HEATHEN
Which I wish to remark —
And my language is plain —
That for ways that are dark
And for tricks that are vain.
TJie heatlien Chinee is peculiar:
Which the same I would rise to
explain.
Ah Sin was liis name;
And I shall not deny
In regard to the same
What that name might imply ;
But liis smile it was pensive and
childlike,
As I frequent remarked to Bill Nye.
It was August the third.
And quite soft was the skies,
^Vliich it might be inferred
Tliat Ah Sin wasUkewise;
Yet he played it that day upon Wil-
liam
And me in a way I despise.
Which we had a small game,
And Ah Sin took a hand:
It was euchre. Tlie same
He did not understand.
But he smiled as he sat by the table.
With the smile that was childlike
and bland.
Yet the cards they were stocked
In a way that 1 grieve.
And my feelings were shocked
At the state of Nye's sleeve,
Which was stuffed full of aces and
bowers,
And the same with intent to de-
ceive.
But the hands that were played
By that heathen CHiinee,
And the points that he made,
AVere quite frightful to see, —
Till at last he put down a right
bower.
Which the same Nye had dealt
unto me.
Then I looked up at Nye,
And he gazed upon me;
And he rose with a sigli.
And said, " Can this be '?
We are ruined by Chinese cheap
labor," —
And he went for tliat heathen
Chinee.
In the scene that ensued
I did not take a hand.
730
HA Y
But the floor it was strewed,
Like tlie leaves on the strand,
Witli the cards tliat Ah Sin had been
liiding
In the game "he did not under-
stand."
In his sleeves, wliich were long,
He had twenty-four jaclcs, —
Which was coming it strong,
Yet I state but the facts.
And Ave foimd on his nails whicli
were taper, — [ wax.
What is frequent in tapers, — that's
Wliich is why I remark.
And my language is plain,
That for ways that are dark.
And for tricks tliat are vain,
The lieathen Chinee is peculiar, —
Wliich the same I am free to main-
tain.
John Hay.
LITTLE BREECHES.
I don't go much on religion,
I never ain't had no show;
But I've got amiddlin' tiglit grip, sir.
On the liandf 111 of things I know.
I don't pan out on the prophets
And free-will, and that sort of
thing, —
But I b'lieve in God and tlie angels.
Ever sence one night last spring.
I come into town with some turnips.
And my little Gabe came along, —
No four-year-old in tlie county
Could beat liim for pretty and
strong.
Peart and chipper and sassy.
Always ready to swear and fight, —
And I'd larnt him to chaw terbacker
Jest to Iveep his milk-teetli white.
The snow come down like a blanlcet
As I passed by Taggart's store;
I went in for a jug of molasses
And left the team at tlie door.
They scared at something and start-
ed, —
I heard one little squall,
And liell-to-split over the prairie.
Went team. Little Breeches and all.
Hell-to-spMt over the prairie!
I was almost froze with skeer;
But we rousted up some torches,
And sarched for 'em far and near.
At last we struck bosses and wagon.
Snowed under a soft white mound,
Upsot, dead beat, — but of little Gabe
No hide nor liair was found.
And here all hope soured on me.
Of my fellow-critter's aid, —
I jest flopped down on my marrow-
bones,
Crotcli-deep in the snow, and
prayed.
By this, the torches was played out,
And me and Isrul Parr
Went off for some wood to a sheep-
fold
That he said was somewhar thar.
We found it at last, and a little shed
Where tliey sliut up the lambs at
night.
We locked in and seen tliem hud-
dled thar.
So warm and sleepy and white;
And THAR sot Little Breeclies and
cliirped.
As peart as ever you see.
" I want a chaw of terbacker.
And that's wliat's the matter of
How did he git thar? Angels.
He could never have walked in
tliat storm ;
They jest scooped down and toted
him
To wliar it was safe and warm.
HAY.
731
And 1 think that saving a little child,
And bi'inging him to liis own,
Is a denied sight better business
Than loafing round the Throne.
JIM BLUDSO, OF THE PRAIRIE
BELLE.
Wall, no! 1 can't tell whar he
lives,
Because he don't live, you see;
Leastways, he's got out of the habit
Of iivin' like you and me,
Whar have you been for the last
three year
That you have'nt heard folks tell
How Jimmy Bludso passed in his
checks
The night of the Prairie Belle ?
He weren't no saint, — them engi-
neers
Is all pretty much alike, —
One wife in Natchez-under-the-Hill
And another one here, in Pike;
A keerless man in his talk was Jim,
And an awkward hand in a row,
But he never flunked, and he never
lied, —
1 reckon he never knowed how.
And this was all the religion he
had, —
To treat his engine well;
Never be passed on the river
To mind the pilot's bell;
And if ever the Prairie Belle took
fire, —
A thousand times he swore.
He'd hold her nozzle agin the bank
Till the last soul got ashore.
All boats has their d-ay on the Mis-
sissip.
And her day come at last. —
The Movastar was a better boat.
But the Belle she wouldn't be
passed.
And so she came tearin' along that
night —
The oldest craft on the line —
With a nigger squat on her safety-
valve.
And her furnace crammed, rosin
and i)ine.
The fire burst out as she dared tlie
bar.
And burnt a hole in the night.
And quiclv as a flash she turned, and
made
For that wilier-bank on the right.
There was runnin' and cursin', but
Jim yelled out.
Over all tlie infernal roar,
"I'll hold her nozzle agin the liank
Till the last galoot's ashore."
Through the hot, black breath of the
burnin' boat
Jim Bludso's voice was heard.
And they all had trust in his cussed-
ness,
And knowed he would keep his
word.
And sure's you're born, they all got
off
Afore the smokestacks fell, —
And Bludso's ghost went up alone
In the smoke of the Prairie Belle.
He weren't no saint, — but at jedg-
ment
I'd run my chance with Jim,
'Longside of some pious gentlemen
That wouldn't shook hands with
him.
He seen his duty, a dead-sure thing, —
And went for it thar and then;
And Christ ain't a going to be too
hard
On a man that died for men.
Oliver Wendell Holmes.
A FAMILIAR LETTER TO SEVERAL
CORRESPONDENTS.
Yes, ■H'l'ite, if you want to, there's
iiothinc; like trying;
Who knows what a treasure your
casket may hold ?
I'll show you that rhyniing's as easy
as lying
If you'li listen to nie while the art
I unfold.
Here's a book full of words: one can
choose as he fancies,
As a painter his tint, as a workman
his tool ;
Just think! all the poems and plays
and romances
Were drawn out of this, like the
fish from a pool !
You can wander at will through its
syllabled mazes.
And take all you want, — not a
copper they cost, —
What is there to hinder your picking
out phrases
For an epic as clever as " Paradise
Lost" ?
Don't mind if the index of sense is at
zero.
Use words that run smoothly,
whatever they mean ;
Leander and Lilian and Lillibullero
Are much the same thing in the
rhyming machine.
There are words so delicious their
sweetness will smother
That boarding-school flavor of which
we're afraid, —
There is '*lush" is a good one, and
" swirl " is another, —
Put both in one stanza, its fortune
is made.
With musical murmurs and rhythmi-
cal closes
You can cheat us of smiles when
you've nothing to tell;
You hand us a nosegay of milliner's
roses.
And we cry with delight, " O, how
sweet they do smell!"
Perhaps you will answer all needful
conditions
For winning the laurels to which
you aspire.
By docking the tails of the two prep-
ositions
I' the style o' the l)ards you so
greatly admire.
As for subjects of verse, they are
only too plenty
For ringing the changes on metri-
cal chimes:
A maiden, a moonbeam, a lover of
twenty.
Have filled that great basket with
bushels of rhymes.
Let me show you a picture — 'tis fur
from irrelevant —
By a famous old hand in the arts
of design;
'Tis only a photographed sketch of
an elephant, —
The name of the draughtsman was
Rembrandt of Rhine.
How easy ! no troublesome colors to
lay on.
It can't have fatigued liini, — no,
not in the least, —
A dash here and there with a haj)-
hazard crayon,
And there stands the wrinkled-
skinned, baggy-limbed beast.
Just so with your verse, — 'tis as easy
as sketching, —
You can reel off a song without
knitting your brow,
As lightly as Rembrandt a drawing
or etching;
It is nothing at all, if you only
know how.
HOLMES.
733
Well: imagine you've printed your
volume of verses ;
Yoiu- forehead is wreathed with
the garland of fame,
Your poem the eloquent school-boy
rehearses.
Her album the school-girl presents
for your name ;
Each morning the post brings you
autograph letters ;
You'll answer them promptly,—
an hour isn't nuich
For the honor of sharing a page with
your betters,
With magistrates, members of Con-
gress, and such.
Of course you're delighted to serve
the committees
That come with requests from the
country all round;
Y^ou would grace the occasion with
poems and ditties
When they've got a new school-
house, "or poorhouse or pound.
With a hymn for the saints and a
song for the sinners.
You go and are welcome wherever
you please ;
Y'ou're a privileged guest at all man-
ner of dinners.
You've a seat on the platform
among the grandees.
At length your mere presence be-
comes a sensation,
Your cup of enjoyment is filled to
its brim
With the pleasure Horatian of digit-
monstration,
As the whisper runs round of
" That's he ! " or " That's him !"
But remember, O dealer in phrases
sonorous,
So daintily chosen, so tunefully
matched,
Though you soar with the wings of
the cherubim o'er us.
The ovum was human from which
you were hatched.
No will of your own with its puny
compulsion
Can summon the spirit that quick-
ens the lyre;
It comes, if at all, like the sibyl's
convulsion
And touches the brain with a finger
of fire.
So perhaps, after all, it's as well to
be quiet.
If you've nothing you think is
worth saying in prose.
As to furnish a meal of their canni-
bal diet
To the critics, by publishing, as
you propose.
But it's all of no use, and I'm sorry
I've written, —
I shall see your thin volume some
day on my shelf ;
For the rhyming tarantula surely has
bitten.
And nuisic must cure you, so pipe
it yourself.
THE StiPTEMBER GALE.
I'm not a chicken: I have seen
Full many a chill September,
And though I was a youngster then.
That gale I well remember;
The day before my kite-string
snapped.
And I, my kite pursuing,
The wind whisked off my palm-leaf
hat, —
For me two storms were breMing!
It came as quarrels sometimes do,
When married folks get clashing;
There was a heavy sigh or two,
Before the fire was flashing, —
A little stir among the clouds.
Before they rent asunder, —
A little rocking of the trees,
And then came on the thunder.
Lord: how the ponds and rivers
boiled I
They seemed like bursting craters!
And oaks lay scattered on the ground
As if they wore p'taters;
734
HOOD.
And all above was in a howl,
And all below a clatter, —
The earth was like a frying-pan,
Or some such hissing matter.
It chanced to be our washing-day,
And all our things were drying;
The storm came roaring through the
lines.
And set them all a flying;
I saw the shirts and petticoats
Go riding oi¥ like witches:
I lost, ah! bitterly I wept, —
I lost my Sunday breeches !
I saw them straddling through the air,
Alas ! too late to win them ;
I saw them chase the clouds, as if
The devil had been in them ;
They were my darlings and my pride,
My boyhood's only riches, —
"Farewell, farewell," I faintly cried:
" My breeches' O my breeches!"
That night I saw them in my dreams,
How changed from what I knew
them !
The dews had steeped their faded
threads.
The winds had whistled through
them !
I saw the wide and ghastly rents
AVhere demon claws liad torn
them ;
A hole was in their amplest part,
As if an imp had worn them.
I have had many happy years,
And tailors kind anil clever.
But those young pantaloons have
gone
Forever and forever!
And not till fate has cut the last
Of all my earthly stitches.
This aching heart shall cease to
mourn
My loveil, my long-lost breeches !
Thomas Hood.
TO MY IXFAAT SOX.
Tiiou happy, happy elf !
(But stop; first let me kiss away that
tear. )
Thou tiny image of myself!
(My love, he's poking peas into his
ear, )
Thou merry, laughing sprite,
With spirits, feather light,
Untouched by sorrow, and unsoiled
by sin.
(My dear, the child is swallowing a
pin!)
Tliou little tricksy Puck!
"Willi antic toys so funnily bestuck.
Light as the singing bird that wings
the air, —
(The door! the door! he'll tumble
down the stair!)
Thou darling of thy sire!
(Why. .lane, he'll set his pinafore
atire!)
Thou imp of mirth and joy !
In love's dear chain so bright a link.
Thou idol of thy parents; — (Drat
the boy I
There goes my ink. )
Thou cherub, but of earth;
Fit playfellow for fairies, by moon-
light pale.
In harmless sport and mirth,
(That dog will bite him, if he piUls
his tail!)
Thou human humming-bee, ex-
tracting honey
From every blossom in the world that
blows.
Singing in youth's Elysium ever
sunny, —
( Another tumble ! That's his precious
nose!)
Thy father's pride and hope!
(He'll break the mirror with that
skipping-rope!)
With pure heart newly stamped from
Natiu'e's mint,
(Where did he learn that squint ?)
HOOD.
Thou young domestic dove!
(He'll have'that ring off with another
shove, )
Dear nursling of the hymeneal nest!
(Are these torn clothes his best ?)
Little epitome of man!
(He'll climb upon the table, that's his
plan.)
Touched with the beauteous tints of
dawning life,
(He's got a knife!)
Thou enviable being!
No storms, no clouds, in thy blue sky
foreseeing,
Play on, play on,
My el tin John!
Toss the light ball, bestride the
stick, —
(I knew so many cakes would make
iiim sick!)
With fancies buoyant as the thistle-
down,
Prompting the feat grotesque, and
antic brisk.
With many a lamb-like frisk!
(He's got the scissors, snipping at
your gown ! )
Thou pretty opening rose!
(Go to your mother, child, and wipe
your nose!)
Balmy and breathing music like the
south,
(He really brings my heart into my
mouth!) [dove;
Bold as the hawk, yet gentle as the
( I'll tell you what, my love,
I cannot write unless he's sent above. )
JOHN DAY.
Jonx Day he was the biggest man
Of all the coachman kind.
With back too bi'oad to be conceived
By any narrow mind.
The very horses knew his weight
When he was in the rear.
And wished his box a Christmas-box
To come but once a year.
Alas! against the shafts of love
What armor can avail ?
Soon Cupid sent an arrow through
His scarlet coat of mail.
The bar-maid of the Crown he loved,
From whom he never ranged ;
For though he changed his liorses
there.
His love he never changed.
He thought her fairest of all fares.
So fontUy love prefers;
And often, among twelve outsides.
Deemed no outside like hers.
One day, as she was sitting down
Beside the porter-pump.
He came, and knelt witli all his fat.
And made an offer plump.
Said she, " My taste will never learn
To like so huge a man.
So I must beg you will come here
As little as you can."
But still he stoutly in-ged his suit.
With vows, and sighs, and tears.
It could not pierce her heart, al-
though
He drove the " Dart" for years.
In vain he wooed, in vain lie sued;
The maid was cold and proud,
And sent him off to Coventry,
While on his way to Stroud.
He fretted all the way to Stroud,
And thence all back to town;
The course of love was never smooth,
So his went up and down.
At last her coldness made him pine
To merely bones and skin.
But still he loved like one resolve 1
To love through thick and thin.
" O Mary! view my wasted back.
And see my dwindled calf;
Though I have never had a wife.
I've lost my better half."
Alas! in vain he still assailed.
Her heart withstood the dint;
Though he had carried sixteen stone,
He could not move a flint.
Worn out, at last he made a vow
To l)reak his being's link:
For he was so reduced in size
At nothhig he could shrink. •
HOOD.
Now some will talk in waters praise,
And waste a deal of breath,
Ikit John, though he drank nothing
else,
He drank himself to death.
The cruel maid that caused his love,
P^ound out the fatal close.
For looking in the butt, she saw
The butt-end of his woes.
Some say his spirit haunts the Crown,
But that is only talk —
For after riding all his life.
His ghost objects to walk.
NUMBER ONE.
It's very hard ! — and so it is,
To live in such a row, —
And witness this, that every Miss
But me has got a beau.
For Love goes calling up and down.
But here he seems to shun ;
I am sure he has been asked enough
To call at Number One!
I'm sick of all the double knocks
That come to Number Four!
At Number Three I often see
A lover at the door;
And one in blue, at Number Two,
Calls daily, like a dun. —
It's very hard they come so near,
And not to Number One !
^liss Bell, I hear, has got a dear
Exactly to her mind, —
P.y sitting at the window-pano
Without a bit of blind;
But I go in the balcony,
Which she has never done;
Yet arts that thrive at Number Five
Don't take at Number One.
"Tis hard, with plenty in the street.
And plenty passing by, —
'J'here's nice young men at Number
Ten,
But only rather shy;
And Mrs. Smith across the way
Has got a grown-up son.
But, la! he hardly seems to know
There is a Number One!
There's Mr. Wick at Number Nine,
But he's intent on pelf;
And though he's pious, will not love
His neighbor as himself.
At Number Seven there was a sale —
The goods had quite a run!
And here I've got my single lot
On hand at Number One !
My mother often sits at work.
And talks of props and stays.
And what a comfort 1 shall be
In her declining days:
The very maids about the house
Have set me down a nun.
The sweethearts all belong to them
That call at Number One!
Once only, when the fine took fire,
One Friday afternoon,
Young Mr. Long came kindly in
And told me not to swoon :
Why can't he come again, without
The Pha='nix and the Sun ?
We cannot always have a flue
On fire at Number One !
I am not old : I am not plain ;
Nor awkwai'd in my gait —
I am not crooked like the bride
That went from Number Eight:
I'm sure white satin made her look
As brown as any bun —
But even beauty has no chance,
I think, at Number One !
At Number Six they say Miss Rose
Has slain a score of hearts.
And Cupid, for her sake, has been
CJuite prodigal of darts.
The Imp they show with bended
bow,
I wish he had a gun!
But if he had he'd never deign
To shoot with Number One!
It's very hard, and so it is,
To live in such a row!
And here's a ballad-singer come
To aggravate my woe :
Oh. take away your foolish song.
And tones enough to stun —
There is "Naeluck about the house,"
I know, at Number One!
I'M NOT A SINGLE MAN.
Well, I confess, 1 dkl not guess
A simple maii'iage vow
Would make me find all women-kind
kSucIi unkind women now!
They need not, sure, as dlslunt be
As Java or Japan, —
Yet every Miss reminds me this —
I'm not a single man!
Once they made choice of my bass
voice
To share in each duet;
So well 1 danced, 1 somehow chanced
To stand in every set:
They now declare I cannot sing,
And dance on Bruin's plan;
Me draw ! — me paint ! — me any-
thing!—
I'm not a single man!
Once I was asked advice, and tasked
What works to buy or not,
And '* would I read that passage out
I so admired in Scott ? ''
They then could bear to hear one read ;
But if I now began.
How they would snub, "My pretty
page," —
Tm not a single man !
One used to stitch a collar then,
Another hemmed a frill;
I had more pm-ses netted then
Than I could hope to fill.
I once could get a button on,
But now I never can —
My buttons then were Bachelor's —
I'm not a single man!
Oh, how they hated politics
Thrust on me by papa:
But now my chat — they all leave that
To entertain mamma:
Mamma, who praises her own self,
Instead of Jane or Ann,
And lays " her girls" upon the shelf —
I'm not a single man!
Ah me, how strange it is, the change,
In parlor and in hall,
They treat me so. if I but go
To make a morning call.
If they had hair in papers once.
Bolt up the stairs they ran;
They now sit still in dishabille —
I'm not a single man!
Miss Mary Bond was once so fond
Of Romans and of Greeks;
She daily sought my cabinet
To study my antiques.
Well, now she doesn't care a dump
For ancient pot or ]ian,
Her taste at once is modernized —
I'm not a single man!
My spouse is fond of homely life.
And all that sort of thing;
I go to balls without my wife.
And never wear a ring:
And yet each Miss to whom I come.
As strange as Genghis Khan,
Knows by some sign I can't divine —
I'm not a single man!
Go where I will, I but intrude,
I'm left in crowded rooms.
Like Zimmerman on Solitude,
Or Hervey at his Tombs.
From head to heel they make me feel
Of quite another clan :
Compelled to own, thougli left alone,
I'm not a single man !
Miss Towne the toast, though she can
boast
A nose of Roman line,
Will turn up even that in scorn
At compliments of mine:
She should have seen that I have been
Her sex's partisan,
And really married all I could —
I'm not a single man !
'Tis hard to see how others fare,
Whilst I rejected stand, —
Will no one take my arm because
They cannot have my hand ?
Miss Parry, that for some would go
A flip to Hindostan,
With me don't care to mount a stair —
I'm not a single man !
Some change, of course, should be in
force,
But, surely, not so much —
738
HOOD.
There may be hands I may not
squeeze,
But must I never touch ?
Must I forbear to hand a chah-
And not pick up a fan ?
But I have been myself picked up —
I'm not a single man !
Others may hint a lady's tint
Is purest red and white, —
May say her eyes are like the skies.
So very blue and bright —
I must not say that she has eyes,
Or if I so began,
1 have my fears about my ears —
I'm not a single man!
I must confess I did not guess
A simple marriage vow.
Would make me find all women-kind
Such unkind women now;
I might be hashed to death, or
smashed.
By Mr. Pickford's van,
Without, I fear, a single tear —
I'm not a single man!
THE DOUBLE KNOCK.
Eat-tat it went upon the lion's
chin ;
"That hat, I know it!'' cried the
joyful girl;
" Summer's it is, I know bin) by his
knock ;
Comers like him are welcome as the
day!
Lizzie ! go down and open the street
door;
Busy I am to any one but him.
Know liim you must — he has been
often here;
Show him upstairs, and tell lum I'm
alone."
Quickly the maid went tripping down
the stair;
Thickly the heart of Rose Matilda
beat ;
"Sure he has brought me tickets for
the play —
Drury — or Covent Garden — darling
man!
Kemble will play — or Kean. who
makes the soul
Tremble in Richard or llie frenzied
Moor —
Farren, the stay and prop of many a
farce
Barren beside — or Liston, Laugh-
ter's child —
Kelly, the natural, to witness whom
Jelly is nothing to the public's jam —
('ooper, the sensible — and Walter
Knowles
Super, in William Tell, now rightly
told.
Better — perchance, from Andrews,
brings a box,
Letter of boxes for the Italian stage —
Brocard! Donzelli! Taglioni! Paul!
No card — thank Heaven — engages
me to-night!
Feathers, of course — no turban and
no toque —
Weather's against it, but I'll go in
curls.
Dearly I dote on white — my satin
dress.
Merely one night — it won't be much
the worse —
Cupid — the new ballet I long to
see —
Stupid! why don't she go and ope the
door? ' '
Glistened her eye as tlie impatient
girl
Listened, low bending o'er the top-
most stair.
Vainly, alas ! she listens and she
bends.
Plainly she hears this question and
reply :
"Axes your pardon, sir, but what
d'ye waiit ? "
" Taxes," says he, " and shall not
call again! "
THE CIGAR.
Some sigh for this and that,
My wishes don't go far.
The world may wag at will,
So I have my cigar.
HOOD.
739
Some fret themselves to death,
With AVhig and Tory jar;
I don't care which Is in,
So I have my cigar.
Sir John requests my vote.
And so does Mr. Marr;
I don't care how it goes,
So I liave my cigar.
Some want a German row.
Some wish a Russian war.
I care not — I'm at peace —
So I have my cigar.
I never see the Post,
I seldom read the Star,
The Globe I scarcely heed,
So I have my cigar.
They tell me that bank stock
Is sunk much under par,
It's all the same to me.
So I have my cigar.
Honors have come to men,
My juniors at the bar.
No matter — I can wait,
So I have my cigar.
Ambition frets me not;
A cab, or glory's car
Are just the same to me,
So I have my cigar.
I worship no vain gods,
But serve the household Lar :
I'm sure to be at home.
So I have my cigar.
I do not seek for fame,
A general with a scar;
A private let me be,
So I have my cigar.
To have my choice among
The toys of life's bazaar.
The deuce may take them all.
So I have my cigar.
Some minds are often tost
By tempests, like a Tar;
1 always seem in port,
So I have my cigar.
The ardent flame of love.
My bosom cannot char;
I smoke, but do not burn,
So I have my cigar.
They tell me Nancy Low
Has mari-ied Mr. li :
The jilt ! but I can live.
So I have my cigar.
FAITHLESS XELLY GRAY.
Ben Battle was a soldier bold.
And used to war's alarms:
But a cannon-ball took otf his legs,
So he laid down his arms I
Now, as they bore him off the field,
Said he. " Let others shoot,
For here I leave my second leg.
And the Forty-second P'oot ! "
The army surgeons made him limbs:
Said he, " They're only pegs;
But there 's as wooden members
quite.
As represent my legs! "
Now Ben he loved a pretty maid.
Her name was Nelly Gray;
So he went to pay her his devours
When he'd devoured his pay!
But when he called on Nelly Gray,
She made him quite a scoff;
And when she saw his wooden legs,
Began to take them off !
" O Nelly Gray! O Nelly Gray!
Is this your love so warm ?
The love that loves a scarlet coat.
Should be more uniform! '"
Said she, " I loved a soldier once,
For he was blithe and brave;
But I will never have a man
With both legs in the grave !
" Before you had those timber toes,
Your love I did allow.
But then, you knoM', you stand upon
Another footing now! "
740
HOOD.
" O Nelly Gray! O Nelly Gray!
For all your jeering speeches,
At duty's call I left my legs
In Badajos's breacliea ! ^^
" Why, then," said she, "'you've lost
the feet
Of legs in war's alarms,
And now you cannot wear yoiu* shoes
Upon your feats of arms!"
" Oh, false and fickle Nelly Gray;
I know why you refuse: [man
Though I've no feet — some other
Is standing in my shoes!
" I wish I ne'er had seen your face;
But, now. a long farewell !
For you will be my death; — alas!
You will not be my Nell .' "'
Now, when he went from Nelly Gray,
His heart so heavy got —
And life was such a burthen grown.
It made him take a knot !
So round his melancholy neck
A rope he did entwine.
And, for his second time in life.
Enlisted in the Line!
One end he tied around a beam,
And then removed his pegs,
And, as his legs were otf, — of course.
He soon was off his legs !
And there he hung till he was dead
As any nail in town, —
For though distress had cut him up,
It eoidd not cut him down!
A dozen men sat on his corpse.
To find out why he died —
And they buried Ben in four cross-
roads.
With a atake in his inside!
FAITHLESS SALLY BROlfX.
Young Ben he was a nice young
man,
A carpenter hy trade.
And he fell in love with Sally Brown,
That was a lady's maid.
But as they fetched a walk one day,
They met a press-gang crew ;
And Sally she did faint away,
AVhilst Ben he was brought to.
The boatswain swore with wicked
words.
Enough to shock a saint.
That though she did seem in a fit,
'Twas nothing but a feint.
" Come, girl," said he, "hold up your
head.
He'll be as good as me;
For when your swain is in our boat,
A boatswain he will be."
So when they'd made their game of
her,
And taken off her elf.
She roused, and found she only was
A coming to herself.
" And is he gone, and is he gone?"
She cried, and wept outright :
" Then I will to the water side.
And see him out of sight."
A waterman came up to her:
"Now. young woman." said he,
'■ If you weep on so. you will make
Eye-water in the sea."
" Alas! they've taken my beau Ben
To sail with old Benbow; "
And her woe began to run afresh.
As if she'd saitl Gee woe!
Says he, '' They've only taken him
To the Tender ship, you see;"
" The Tender ship," cried Sally
Brown,
What a hard-ship that must be!
"Oh ! would I were a mermaid
now.
For then I'd follow him;
But, oh! — I'm not a fisb-woman.
And so I cannot swim.
'•Alas! I was not born beneath
The Virgin and the Scales,
So I must curse my cruel stars,
And walk about in Wales."
Now Ben had sailed to many a
place
That's miderneath the world;
IJut in two years the ship came
liome,
And all her sails were fm'led.
But when he called on Sally Brown,
To see how she went on,
He found she'd got another Ben,
Whose Christian name was John.
" O Sally Brown, O Sally Brown,
How could you serve me so ?
I've met with many a breeze before.
But never such a blow.''
Then reading on his 'bacco-box,
He heaved a bitter sigh,
And then began to eye his pipe,
And then to pipe his eye.
And then he tried to sing, '• \.ll 's
Well."
But could not, though he tried;
His head was turned, and so he
chewed
His pigtail till he died.
[berth,
His death, which happened in his
At forty-odd befell :
They went and told the sexton, and
The sexton tolled the bell.
THE ART OF BOOK-KEEPING.
How hard, when those who do not wish to lend, thus lose, their books,
Are snai-ed by anglers,— folks that fish with literary Hooks, —
Who call an(i take some favorite tome, but never read it through; —
They thus complete their set at home, by making one at you.
I, of my " Spenser " quite bereft, last winter sore was shaken;
Of " Lamb " I've but a quarter left, nor could I save my '* Bacon;"
And then I saw my " Crabbe," at last, like Hamlet, backward go;
And, as the tide was ebbing fast, of course I lost my " Rowe."
My '• Mallet " served to knock me down, which makes me thus a talker;
And once, when I was out of town, my " Johnson " proved a " Walker."
While studying, o'er the fire, one day, my '• Hobbes," amidst the smoke,
They bore my " Colman " clean away, and carried off my " Coke."
They picked my " Locke," to me far more than Braraah's patent worth.
And now my losses I deplore, without a " Home " on earth.
If once a book you let them lift, another they conceal.
For though 1 caught them stealing " Swift," as swiftly went my " Steele."
" Hope" is not now upon my shelf, where late he stood elated;
But what is strange my "Pope" himself is excommunicated.
My little " Suckling " in the grave is simk to swell the ravage;
And what was Crusoe's fate to save, 'twas mine to lose, — a "' Savage."
Even " Glover's " works I cannot put my frozen hands upon ;
Though ever since I lost my " Foote," my " Bunyan " has been gone.
My " Hoyle " with " Cotton " went oppressed ; my " Taylor." too, must fail;
To save my " Goldsmith" from arrest, in vain I offered " Bayle."
I " Prior" sought, but could not see the " Hood" so late in front;
And when I turned to hunt for " Lee," oh! where was my " Leigh Hunt" ?
I tried to laugh, old cai-e to tickle, yet could not " Tickle "' touch ?
And then, alack! I missed my " Mickle," — and surely Mickle 's nuich.
742
HOPKINSON.
'Tis quite enough my griefs to feed, my sorrows to excuse.
To think 1 cannot read my " Reid," nor even use my " Hughes; "
My classics would not quiet lie, a thing so fondly hojied;
Like Dr. Primrose, 1 may cry, my " Livy " has eloped.
My life is ebbing fast away ; 1 suffer from these shocks,
And though 1 fixed a lock on " Gray," there's gray upon my locks;
I'm far from " Young," am growing pale, I see my '* Butler" fly;
And when they ask about my ail, 'tis " Burton," 1 reply.
They still have made me slight returns, and thus my griefs divide;
For, oh! they cured me of my " Burns," and eased my " Akenside."
But all I think 1 shall not say, nor let my anger burn.
For, as they never found me " Gay," tliey have not left me " Sterne.'
Francis Hopkinson.
THE BATTLE OF THE KEGS.
Gallants, attend and hear a friend
Trill forth harmonious ditty ;
Strange things I'll tell which late be-
fell
In Philadelphia city.
'Twas early day, as poets say,
Just when the sun was rising,
A soldier stood on a log of wood,
And saw a thing suri^rising.
As in amaze he stood to gaze,
The truth can't be denied, sir,
He spied a score of kegs or more
Come floating down the tide, sir.
A sailor too, in jerkin blue.
This strange appearance viewing.
First rubbed his eyes, in great sur-
prise,
Then said some mischief 's brewing.
These kegs, I'm told, the rebels hold
Packed up like pickled herring;
And they're come down t' attack the
town.
In this new way of ferrying.
The soldier flew, the sailor too.
And scared almost to death, sir,
Wore out their shoes, to spread the
news.
And ran till out of breath, sir.
Now up and down throughout the
town
Most frantic scenes were acted ;
And some ran here, and others there,
Like men almost distracted.
Some fire cried, which some denied,
But said the earth had quaked;
And girls and boys, with hideous
noise.
Ran through the streets half naked.
From sleep Sir William starts upright.
Awaked by such a clatter;
He rubs both eyes, and boldly cries.
For God's sake, what's the matter ?
At his bedside he then espied
Sir Erskine at command, sir;
Upon one foot lie had one boot.
And til' other in his hand, sir.
" Arise, arise! " Sir Erskine cries;
'■ The rebels — more 's the pity —
Without a boat are all afloat.
And ranged before the city.
"The motley crew, in vessels new,
^Vith Satan for their guiile, sir,
Packed up in bags, or wooden kegs.
Come driving down the tide, sir.
" Therefore prepare for bloody war;
These kegs must all be routed.
Or surely we despised shall be.
And British courage doubted."
LANDOE.
743
The royal band now ready stand,
All ranged in dread array, sir,
With stomach stout, to see it out.
And make a bloody day, sir.
The cannons roar, from shore to
shore.
The small arms make a rattle ;
Since wars began I'm sure no man
E'er saw so strange a battle.
The rebel dales, the rebel vales,
With rebel trees surrounded ;
The distant woods, the hills
floods.
With rebel echoes sounded.
and
The fish below, swam to and fro,
Attacked from every quarter;
Why, sure, thought they, the devil's
to pay
'Mongst folks above the water.
The kegs, 'tis said, though strongly
made
Of rebel staves and hoops, sir.
Could not opi30se their powerful foes.
The conq'ring British troops, sir.
From morn to night these men of
might
Displayed amazing courage;
And when the sun was fairly down
Retired to sup their porridge.
An hundred men, with each a pen,
Or more, upon my word, sir.
It is most true would be too few
Their valor to record, sir.
Such feats did they perform that day
Against these wicked kegs, sir.
That years to come, if they get home.
They'll make their boast and brags,
Walter Savage Landor.
THE ONE WHITE HAIR.
The wisest of the wise
Listen to pretty lies
And love to hear them told;
Doubt not that Solomon
Listened to many a one, —
Some in his youth, and more when
he grew old.
I never was among
The choir of Wisdom's song.
But pretty lies loved I,
As much as any king.
When youth was on the wing,
And (must it then be told '?) when
youth had quite gone by.
Alas ! and I have not
The pleasant hour forgot
When one pert lady said
" O Landor I I am quite
Bewildered with affright !
I see (sit quiet now) a white hair on
your head I "
Another more benign
Di'ew out that hair of mine,
And in her own dark hair
Pretended it was found.
That one, and twirled it round ;
Fair as slie was she never was so fair!
UNDER THE LINDENS.
Under the lindens lately sat
A couple, and no more, in chat;
I wondereil what they would be at
Under the lindens.
I saw four eyes and four lips meet;
I heard the words, "How sweet!
how sweet!"
Had then the fairies given a treat
Under the lindens ?
I pondered long, and could not tell
What dainty pleased them both so
well :
Bees! oees! was it your hydromel
Under the lindens ?
LELAND.
Charles Godfrey Leland.
[From Brcitmann about Town.]
CI TV EXPERIENCES.
Dey vented to de Opera Hans,
Und d(M-e dey vound em blayin'.
Of Ott'enbach (der o/xh brook),
His show spiel Belle llelene.
"Dere's Often bach, — Sebastian Bach ;
Mit Kanlbacli, — dat makes dree:
I alvays likes soosh brooks ash dese,"
iSaid Breitemann, said he.
Dey vented to de Bibliothek,
Vhich Mishder Astor hilt:
Some |)ooks vere only en broschnre,
Und some vere pound unil gilt.
" Dat makes de gold — dat makes de
Sinn,
Mit pooks, ash men, ve see,
De pest tressed vellers gilt de most: "
Said Breitemann, said he.
Dey vent oonto a bictnre sale.
Of frames wort' many a cent,
De broberty of a shendleman.
Who oonto Europe vent.
"Don't gry — he'll soon pe pack
again
Mit anoder gallerie :
He sells dem oud dwelf dimes a
year,"
Said Breitemann, said he.
Dey vented to dis berson's house.
To see his furnidure,
Sold oud at aucdion rite afay,
Berembdory und sure.
" He geeps six houses all at vonce,
Each veek a sale dere pe ;
Gotts! vat a dime liis vife moost
hafe!" —
Said Breitemann, said lie.
Dey vent to hear a breecher of
De last sensadion slityle,
'Twas 'nougli to make der tyfel weep
To see his " awful slnnile."
" Yot bities dat der Fechter ne'er
Vas in Tlieologie.
Dey'd make him liishop in dis
shoorsli,"
Said Breitemann, said he.
Dey vent polid'gal meedins next,
Dey hear dem rant and I'ail,
Der bresident vas a forger,
Shoost bardoned oud of jail.
He does it oud of cratitood
'I'o dem who set him vree:
" Id's Harmonie of Inderesds,"
Said Breitemann, said he.
Dey vent to a clairfoyand vitch,
A plack-eyed handsome maid,
She wahrsagt all der vortunes — denn
*' Fife dollars, gents! " she said.
" Dese vitches are nod of dis eart',
Und yed are on id, I see
Der Shakesbeare knew de preed right
veil,"
Said Breitemann, said he.
Dey vented to a restaurand,
Der vaiter coot a dasli ;
He garfed a shicken in a vink,
Und serfed id at a vlash.
" Dat shap knows veil shoost how to
coot,
Und roon mit poulterie,
He vas copitain oonder Turchin
vonce,"
Said Breitemann, said he.
Dey vented to de Voman's Righds,
Vere laties all agrees
De gals shoidd pe de voters,
Und deir beaux all de votees.
" For efery man dat nefer vorks.
Von frau should vranchised pe:
Dat ish de vay I solf dis ding,"
Said Breitemann, said he.
LEVER.
745
. SCHNirZEliUS PHILOSOPEDE.
Heijk Schnitzekl make a philoso-
l^ede,
Von of de pullyest kind ;
It vent mitout a vheel in front,
And hadn't none peliind.
Von vheel vas in de niiltel, dough,
Anil it vent as sure as ecks,
For he shtraddled on de axle-dree
Mit de vheel petween his leeks.
Und ven he vant to shtart id off.
He paddlet mit his feet,
Und soon he cot to go so vast
Dat avery dings he peat.
He run her out on Broader Slitreed,
He shkeeted like der vind;
Hei ! how he bassed de vancy crabs.
And lef dem all pehind !
De vellers mit de trottin nags
Pooled oop to see him bass;
De Deutschers all erstaunished saidt:
"Potztnuseml ! Was ist das ? "
Boot vaster shtill der Schnitzerl
flewed
On — mit a gashtly smile;
He tidn't tooch de tirt, py shings!
Not vonce iu half a mile.
Oh, vot ish all dis eartly pliss ?
Oh, vot ish man's soocksess ?
Oh, vot ish various kinds of dings?
Und vot isli hobbiness ?
Ve find a pank-node in de shtreedt.
Next dings der pank is preak;
Ve foils, und knocks our outsides in,
Ven ve a ten-shtrike make.
So vas it mit der Schnitzerlein
On his philosopede ;
His feet both shlipped outsideward
shoost
Vhen at his extra shpeed.
He felled oopon der vheel, of course;
De vheel like blitzen flew:
Und Schnitzerl he vas sclmitz in
vact,
For id shlished him grod in two.
Und as for his philosopede,
Id cot so shkared, men say,
It pounded onward till it vent
Ganz teufelwards afay.
Bi;t vhere ish now de Schnitzerl's
soul ?
Vhere dos his slibirit pide ?
In Ilimmel troo de entless plue,
Id dakes a medeor ride.
Charles Lever.
WIDOW M ALONE.
Did you hear of the Widow Malone,
Oh one !
Who lived in the town of Athlone,
Alone !
O, she melted the hearts
Of the swains in them parts;
So lovely the Widow Malone,
Ohone!
So lovely the Widow Malone.
Of lovers she had a full score.
Or more.
And fortunes they all had galoi'C,
In store;
From the minister down
To the clerk of the Crown
All were courting the Widow Malone,
Ohone!
All were courting the Widow Malone,
But so modest was Mistress Malone,
'Twas known
That no one could see her alone,
Ohone!
Let them ogle and sigh.
They could ne'er catch her eye,
So bashful the Widow Malone,
Ohone!
So bashful the Widow Malone.
Till one Misther O'Brien, from Clare
(How quare!
It's little for blushing they care
Down there),
74G
LOVER.
Put his arm round her waist, —
Gave ten kisses at laste, —
" O," says he, ''you're my Molly
Malone !
My own !
O," says he, "you're my Molly
Malone!"
And the widow they all thought so
shy,
My eye !
Ne'er thought of a simper or sigh, —
For why ?
But, "Lucius," says she,
" Since you've now made so free,
You may marry your Mary Malone,
Ohone !
You may marry your Mary Malone."
There's a moral contained in mysong,
Not wrong;
And one comfort, it's not very long,
But strong, —
If for widows you die,
Learn to kiss, not to sigh ;
For they're all like sweet Mistress
Malone,
Ohone!
For they're all like sweet Mistress
Malone.
Samuel Lover.
THE Rlirni OF ST. PATRICK.
On the eighth day of March it was,
some people say.
That Saint Patrick at midnight he
first saw the day ;
While others declare 'twas the ninth
he was born.
And ' twas all a mistake between mid-
night and morn ;
For mistakes will occur in a hurry
and shock,
And some blamed the babby — and
some blamed the clock —
'Till with all their cross questions
sure no one could know
If the child was too fast — or the
clock was too slow.
Now the first faction fight in owld
Ireland, they say.
Was all on account of Saint Patrick's
birthday.
Some fought for the eighth — for the
ninth more woidd die.
And who wouldn't see right, sure
they blacken' d his eye.
At last, both the factions so positive
grew,
That eitrh kept a birth-day, so Pat
then had two.
'Till Father Mulcahy, who showed
them their sins.
Said. " No one could have two birth-
days, but a twins.'"
Says he, " Boys, don't be fighting for
eight or for nine.
Don't be always dividing — but some-
times combine ;
Combine eight with nine, and seven-
teen is the mark,
So let that be his birth-day" —
" Amen," says the clerk.
" If he wasn't a twins, sure our
hist'ry will show —
That, at least, he's worth any two
saints that we know!"
Then they all got blind drunk — which
completed their bliss.
And we keep up the practice from
that day to this.
JiOJiy O'MORE.
Young Rory O'More courted Kath-
leen Bawn,
He was bold as a hawk, and she soft
as the dawn;
H'3 wished in his heart pretty Katli-
leen to please,
And lie thought the best way to do
tliat was to tease.
" Now, Kory, be easy," sweet Kath-
leen would cry,
Keproof on her lip, but a smile in her
eye,
" With your tricks, I don't know, in
throtli, what I'm about.
Faith, you've teased till I've put on
my cloak inside out."
"Oh! jewel," saysliory, "that same
is the way
You've tlu'ated my heart for this
many a day.
And it's piazed that I am, and why
not, to be sure ?
For it's all for good luck," says bold
Kory O'More.
"Indeed, then," says Kathleen,
" don't tliink of the like,
For I half gave a promise to tioother-
Iny Mike;
The ground that I walk on he loves,
I'll be bound:"
"Faith!" says Kory, "I'd rather
love you than the ground."
" Xow, Kory, I'll cry, if you don't
let me go:
Sure I dream ev'ry night that I'm
hating you so!"
"Oh!" says Kory, "that same I'm
delighted to hear.
For dhnunes always go by conthrai-
rie.s, my dear.
Oh! jewel, keep dhraming that same
till you die.
And bright morning will give dirty
night the black lie !
And 'tis piazed that I am, and why
not, to be sure ?
Since 'tis all for good luck," says
bold Kory O'More.
" Arrah. Kathleen, my darlint, you've
teazed me enough.
Sure I've thrash' d for your sake Dinny
Grimes and Jim Duff;
And I've made myself, drinking your
health, quite a haste,
So I think, after that, I may talk to
the prante."
Then Kory, the rogue, stole his arm
round her neck.
So soft and so white, without freckle
or speck.
And he looked in her eyes that were
beaming with light.
And he kissed her sweet lips — don't
you think he was right '?
"Now, Kory, leave off, sir — you'll
hug me no more.
That's eight times to-day you have
kissed me before."
" Then here goes another," says he,
" to make sure.
For there's luck in odd numbers,"
says Kory O'More.
WIDOW MACHREE.
Widow marln-ee, it's no wonder you
frown,
Och hone! widow machree;
Faith, it ruins yoiu- looks, that same
dirty black gown,
Och hone ! widow machree.
How altered your air,
Witli that close cap you wear —
'Tis destroying your hair
Which woidd be flowing free:
Be no longer a churl
Of its black silken curl,
Och hone! widow machree!
Widow machree, now the summer is
come,
Och hone! widow machree;
When everything smiles, should a
beauty look glinn ?
Och hone ! widow machree.
See the birds go in pairs.
And the rabbits and hares —
Why even the bears
Now in couples agree ;
And the mute little fish.
Though they can't spake, they wish,
Och hone ! widow machree.
Widow machree, and ^\hen winter
comes in,
Och hone ! widow machree.
To be poking the fire all alone is a
sin,
Och hone ! widow macliree.
Sure tlie shovel and tongs
To each other belongs,
And the kettle sings songs
Full of family glee;
While alone with your cup,
Like a hermit you sup,
Och hone! widow machree.
And how do you know, with the
comforts I've towld,
Och hone ! widow machree,
But you're keeping some poor fellow
out in the cowld,
Och hone I widow machree.
With such sins on yoiu- head,
Sure your peace would be tied.
Could you sleep in your bed,
Without thinking to see
Some ghost or some sprite.
That would wake you each night,
Crying, "Och hone! widow ma-
chree."
Then take my advice, darling widow
machree,
Och hone ! widow machree.
And with my advice, faith I wish
you'd take me,
Och hone ! widow machree.
You'd have me to desire
Then to stir up the fire;
And sure Hope is no liar
In whispering to me.
That the ghosts M'ould depart,
When you'd me near your heart,
Och hone! widow macliree.
FATHER-LAND AND MOTHER-
TONG UE.
Our Father-land! and would' st thou
know
Why we should call it Father-land '?
It is. that Adam here below,
Was made of earth by Nature's
hand ;
And he, our father, made of earth.
Hath peopled earth on ev'ry hand.
And we, in memory of his birth.
Do call our country, " Father-
. laud."
At first, in Eden's bowers they say,
No sound of speech had Adam
caught.
But whistled like a bird all day —
And may be, 'twas for want of
thought :
But Nature, with resistless laws,
Made Adam soon siu'pass the birds.
She gave him lovely Eve — because
If he'd a wife — they must have
luord.s.
And so, the Native Land I hold.
By male descent is proudly mine ;
The Language, as the tale hath told,
W^as given in the female line.
And thus, we see, on either hand.
We name our blessings whence
they've sprung.
We call our country Father land,
We call oiu' language Mother
iouf/ne.
FATHER MOLLOY.
Paddy McCaije was dying one
day.
And Father Molloy he came to con-
fess him;
Paddy prayed liard he would make
no delay
But forgive him his sins and make
haste for to bless him.
"First tell me your sins," says
Father Molloy,
" For I'll! thinking you've not been
a very good boy."
" Oh," says Paddy, " so late in the
even in' I fear
"Twould throuble you such a long
story to hear.
For you've ten long miles o'er the
mountain to go,
While the road I' re to travel's much
longer, you know:
So give us your blessin' and get in the
saddle,
To tell all my sins my poor brain it
would addle;
And the docthor gave ordhers to
keep me so quiet —
'Twotdd distuib me to tell all my
sins, if I'd thry it,
LOWELL.
749
And your reverence has towkl us, un-
less we tell all,
'Tis worse than not niakin' confes-
sion at all :
So I'll say. in a word, I'm no very
good boy,
And, therefore, yotn- blessin', sweet
Father MoUoy."
" Well, I'll read from a book," says
Father Molloy,
" The manifold sins that human-
ity's heir to;
And when you hear those that your
conscience annoy,
You'll just squeeze my hand, as
acknowledging thereto."
Then the Father began the dark roll
of iniquity.
And Paddy, thereat, felt his con-
science grow rickety,
And he gave such a squeeze that the
priest gave a roar —
" Oh, murdher!" says Paddy, " don't
read any more.
For, if you keep readin', by all that
is thrue.
Your reverence's fist will be soon
black and blue ;
Besides, to be throubled my con-
science begins,
That your reverence should have any
hand in my sins;
So you'd betther suppose I committed
them all.
For whether they're great ones, or
whether they're small,
Or if they're a dozen, or if they're
fourscore,
'Tis your reverence knows how to ab-
solve them, asthore:
So I'll say, in a word, I'm no very
good boy.
And, therefore, your blessin", sweet
Father Molloy."
" ^Yell,'' says Father Molloy, " if
your sins 1 forgive,
So you nnist forgive all your ene-
mies truly;
And i)romise me also tliat, if you
should live,
You'll leave off your tricks, and
begin to live newly,"
" I forgive ev'rybody," says Pat,
with a groan,
" Except that big vagabone, Micky
Mid one;
And him 1 will murdher if ever I
can — "
" Tut, tut!" says the priest, ''you're
a very bad man ;
For without your forgiveness, and
also repentance.
You'll ne'er go to Heaven, and that
is my sentence."
" Poo!" says Paddy McCabe, " that's
a very hard case,
With your Eeverenceand Heaven I'm
content to make pace;
But with Heaven and your Pveverence
I wondher — Odi hone,
You would think of comparin' that
blackguard Malone —
But since I'm hard press'd and that
I Jiti(f side she breshed felt full o' sun
Ez a south slope in Ap'il.
She thought no v'ice hed such a
swing
Ez hisn in the choir;
My ! when he made Ole Hunderd ring.
She knoioed the Lord was nigher.
An' she'd blush scarlit, right in
prayer,
When her new meetin'-bunnet
Felt somehow thru' its crown a pair
O' blue eyes sot upon it.
Thet night, I tell ye, she looked
aoine I
She seemed to 've gut a new soul,
For she felt sartin-sure he'd come,
Down to her very shoe-sole.
She lieered a foot, an' knowed it tu,
A-raspin' on the scraper, —
All ways to once her feelins flew
Like sparks in burnt up, paj^er.
He kin' o' I'itered on the mat.
Some doubtfle o' the sekle,
His heart kep' goin' pity-pat,
But hern went pity Zekle.
An' yit she gin her cheer a jerk
Ez though she wished him furder,
An' on her apples kep' to work,
Parin' away like murder.
" You want to see my pa, I s'pose ?"
" Wal ... no ... I come da-
signin' " —
" To see my ma ? She's sprinkliu'
clo'es
Agin to-morrer's i'nin'."
To say why gals acts so or so,
Or don't, 'ould be presumin' ;
Mebby to mean yes an' say }w
Comes nateral to women.
He stood a spell on one foot fust.
Then stood a spell on t'other.
An' on viiiich one he felt the wust
He could n't ha' told ye nuther.
Says he, " I'd better call agin;"
Says she, " Think likely, mister;"
Thet last word pricked him lik.^ a
pin.
An' . . . Wal, he up an' kist her.
When ma bimeby upon 'em slips,
Huldy sot pale ez ashes.
All kin' o' smily roun' the lips
An' teary roun' the lashes.
For she was jes' the quiet kind
Whose naturs never vary.
Like streams that keep a summei
mind
Snowhid in Jenooary.
LYTTON.
Tlie blood clost roiui" her heart fell
glued
Too tight lor all expressiii',
Tell mother see how luetters stood,
And gill "em both her blessiir.
Then her red come back like the tide
Down to the Bay o' Fimdy,
An' all 1 know is they was cried
In meetin' come nex' Sunday.
friTfJOUT AS I) ]VITHIX.
MYCoachmau. in the moonlight there.
Looks through the side-light of the
door ;
1 hear him with his brethren swear,
As I could do, — but only more.
Flattening his nose against the pane,
He envies me my brilliant lot.
Breathes on his aching tist in vain.
And dooms me to a place more hot.
lie sees me into supper go.
A silken wonder by my side.
Bare arms, bare shoulders, and a row
Of flounces, for the door too wide.
He thinks how happy is my arm
'Neath its white-gloved and je\\-
elled load :
And wishes me some dreadful harm.
Hearing the merry corks explode.
Meanwhile I inly curse the bore
Of hunting still the same old
coon.
And envy him, outside the door,
In golden quiets of the moon.
The winter wind is not so cold
As the bright smile he sees me win.
Nor the host's oldest wine so old
As our poor gabble sour and thin.
1 envy him the ungyved prance
By which his freezing feet he
warms,
And drag my lady's-chains and dance,
The galley-slave of dreary forms.
O, could he have my share of din.
And I his quiet !t- past a doubt
'T woidd still be one man bored
within,
And just another bored withotit.
Robert Bulwer Lytton (Owen Meredith).
[From Lucile.]
TITK STOMACIT OF MAX.
O iioriJ of all hours, the most bless'd
upon earth.
Blessed hour of our dinners!
The land of his birth:
The face of his first love; the bills
that he owes;
The twaddle of friends and the venom
of foes:
The sermon he heard when to church
he last went;
The money he borrow'd, the money
he spent; —
All of these things a man, I believe,
may forget.
And not be the worse for forgetting;
but yet
Never, never, oh, never ! earth's
luckiest sinner
Hath impunished forgotten the hour
of his dinner!
Indigestion, that conscience of every
bad stomach.
Shall relentlessly gnaw and pursue
him with some ache
Or some pain ; and trouble, remorse-
less, his best ease.
As the Furies once troubled tlie sleep
of Orestes.
We may live without poetry, music,
and art;
We may live without conscience, and
live without heart;
We may live without friends; we may
live without books:
But civilized man cannot live without
cooks.
752
LYTTON.
He may live without boolvs, — what is
knowledge but grieving ?
He may live without "hope, — what is
hope but deceiving ?
He may live without love, what is
passion but pining ?
But where is the man that can live
without dining ?
[From Lucile.]
FEW IN MANY.
The age is gone o'er
When a man may in all tilings be all.
We have more
Painters, poets, musicians, and art-
ists, no doubt.
Than the great Cinquecento gave
birth to; but out
Of a million of mere dilettanti, when,
when
Will a new Leonardo arise on our ken?
He is gone with the age which begat
him. Oui" own
Is too vast, and too complex, for one-
man alone
To embody its purpose, and hold it
shut close
In the palm of his hand. There
were giants in those
Irreclaimable days; but in these days
of ours.
In dividing the work we distribute
the powers.
Yet a dwarf on a dead giant's shoul-
ders sees more
Than the 'live giant's eyesight availed
to explore;
And in life's lengthen' d alphabet
what used to be
To our sires X Y Z is to us A I> C.
A Vanini is roasted alive for his
pains.
But a Bacon conies after and picks
np his brains.
A Bruno is angrily seized by the
throttle
And hunted about by thy ghost,
Aristotle,
Till a More or I^avater step into his
place :
Then the world turns and makes an
admiring grimace.
Once the men were so great and so
few, they appear,
Through a distant Olympian atmos-
IDhere,
Like vast Caryatids upholding the
age.
Now the men are so many and small,
disengage
One man from the million to mark
him, next moment
The crowd sweeps him hurriedly out
of your comment;
And since we seek vainly (to praise
in our songs)
'jVIid our fellows the size which to
heroes belongs.
We take the whole age for a hero, in
want
Of a better; and still, in its favor,
descant
On the strength and the beauty which,
failing to find
In any one man, we ascribe to man-
kind.
\_From Lucile.]
THE E nil ATI C GENIUS.
With irresolute finger he knock'd at
each one
Of the doorways of life, and abided
in none.
His course, by each star that would
cross it, was set.
And whatever he did he was sure to
regret,
That target, discuss' d by the travel-
lers of old.
Which to one appear'd argent, to one
appear' d gold,
To him, ever lingering on Doubt's
dizzy margent,
Appeared in one moment both golden
and argent.
The man who seeks one thing in life,
and but one.
May hope to achieve it before life be
done;
But he who seeks all things, wherever
he goes,
Only reaps from the hopes which
around him he sows
A liarvest of barren regrets. And
the worm
That crawls on in the dust to the
definite term
Of its creeping existence, and sees
nothing more
Tiian tlie patli it pursues till its
creeping be o'ei-,
In its limited vision, is happier far
Than the Half-Sage, wliose course,
fix'd no friendly star
Is by eacli star distracted in turn, and
who knows
Each will still be as distant wherever
he goes.
[From Lucile.]
A CHAIiACTER.
The banker, well known
As wearing the longest philacteried
gow'n
Of all the rich Pliarisees England can
boast of;
A shrewd Puritan Scot, whose sharp
wits made the most of
This world and the next; having
largely invested
Not only where treasure is never mo-
lested
By thieves, moth, or rust; Init on this
earthly ball
Where interest was high, and security
small.
Of mankind there was never a theory
yet
Not by some individual instance up-
set:
And so to that sorrowful verse of the
Psalm
Which declares that the wicked ex-
pand like the palm
In a world where the righteous are
stunted and pent,
A cheering exception did IJidley pre-
.sent.
Like the worthy of Uz, Heaven pros-
pered his piety.
The leader of every religious society.
Christian knowledge he labored
through life to promote
With personal profit, and knew how
to quote
Both the Stocks and the Scripture,
with equal advantage
To himself and admiring friends, in
this ('ant-Aa;e.
[From Lucile.]
FAME.
The poets pour wine; and, when 'tis
new, all decry it;
But, once let it be old, evei-y trifler
must ti'y it.
And Polonius, who praises no wine
that's not Massic,
Complains of my verse, that my verse
is not classic.
And Miss Tilburina, who sings, and
not badly.
My earlier verses, sighs *' Common-
place sadly!"
As for you, O Poionius, you vex me
but slightly;
But you, Tilburina, your eyes beam
so brightly
In despite of their languishing looks,
on my word,
That to see you look cross I can
scai'cely afford.
Yes! the silliest woman that smiles
on a bard
Better far than Longinus himself can
reward
The appeal to her feelings of which
she approves;
And the critics I most care to please
are the Loves.
Alas, friend! what boots it, a stone
at his head
And a bi-ass on his breast, — wlien a
man is once dead ?
Ay ! were fame the sole guerdon, poor
guerdon were then
Theirs who, strip])ing life bare, stand
forth models for men.
The reformer's? — a creed by poster-
ity learnt
A century after its author is burnt!
The poet's ? — a laurel that hides the
bald brow
It hath blighted! The painters? —
ask Kaphael now
MACK AY.
Which Madonna's authentic I Tlie
statesman's — a name
For i^arties to blacken, or boys to de-
claim!
The soldier's? — three lines on the
colli Abbey pavement!
Were this all the life of the wise and
the brave meant,
All it ends in, thrice better, Netera,
it were
I'nregarded to sport with thine odor-
ous hair, [shade
Untroubled to lie at thy feet in the
And be loved, Avhile the roses yet
bloom overhead.
Than to sit by the lone hearth, and
think the long thought,
A severe, sad, blind schoolmaster, en-
vied for naught
Save the name of John Milton! For
all men, indeed.
Who in some choice edition may
graciously read, jnote.
With fair illustration, and erudite
The song which the poet in bitter-
ness wrote.
Beat the poet, and notably beat him,
in this —
The joy of the genius is theirs, whilst
they miss
The grief of the man : Tasso's song —
not his madness !
Dante's dreams — not his waking to
exile and sadness!
Milton's nmsic — but not Milton's
blindness! . . .
Yet rise.
My Milton, and answer, with those
noble eyes
Which the glory of heaven hath
blinded to earth!
Say — the life, in the living it, savors
of worth;
That the deed, in the doing it, reaches
its aim:
That the fact has a value ajmrt from
the fame :
That a deeper delight, in the mere
labor, pays
Scorn of lesser delights, and laborious
days :
And Shakespeare, though all Shake-
speare's writings were lost,
And his genius, though never a trace
of it crossed
Posterity's path, not the less would
have dwelt
In the isle with Miranda, with Handet
have felt
x\ll that Hamlet hath littered, and
haply where, pure
On its death-bed, wronged Love lay,
have moaned with the Moor!
Charles Mackay.
TO A FRIEND AFRAID OF CRITICS.
Afraid of critics! an unworthy
fear:
Great minds must learn their great-
ness and be bold.
Walk on thy way; bring forth thine
own true thought;
Love thy high calling only for itself,
And find in working, recompense for
work.
And Envy's shaft shall whiz at thee
in vain. I just;
Despise not censure ; — weigh if it be
And if it be — amend, whate'er the
thought
Of him who cast it. Take the wise
man's praise,
And love thyself the more that thou
couldst earn
Meed so exalted; but the blame of
fools,
Let it blow over like an idle whiff
Of poisonous tobacco in the streets.
Invasive of thy unotfending nose: —
Their praise no better, only more per-
fumed.
The critics — let me paint them as
they are.
Some few I know, and love them from
my sold ;
MACK AY.
755
Polished, acute, deep read ; of inborn
taste
(Adtiired into a virtue ; full of pith
And kindly vigor, having won their
spurs
In the great rivalry of friendly mind,
And generous to others, though un-
known,
Who would, having a thought, let all
men know
The new discovery. But these are
rare;
And if thou find one, take him to
thy heart,
And think his unbought praise both
palm and crown,
A thing worth living for, were nought
beside.
Fear thou no critic, if thou'rt true
thyself; —
And look for fame noiv if the Avise
approve.
Or from a wiser jury yet unborn.
The poetaster may be harmed enough.
But criticasters cannot crush a bard.
If to be famous be thy sole intent,
And greatness be a mark beyond thy
reach.
Manage the critics, and thou 'It win
the game;
Invite them to thy board, and give
them feasts,
And foster them with luu'elaxing
care ;
And they will praise thee in their
partial sheets,
And quite ignore the worth of better
men.
But if thou wilt not court them, let
them go.
And scorn the praise that sells itself
for wine.
Or tacks itself upon success alone.
Hanging like spittle on a rich man's
beard.
One, if thou'rt great, will cite from
thy new book
The tamest passage, — something that
thy soul
Revolts at, now the inspiration's o'er.
And would give all thou hast to blot
from print
And sink into oblivion; — and will
vaunt
The thing as beautiful, transcendent,
rare —
The best thing thou hast done! An-
other friend.
With finer sense, Avill praise thy
greatest thought,
Yetcavil at it; putting in his "6h<.s"
And " yetf<,'^ and little obvious hints,
That though 'tis good, the critic could
have made
A work superior in its every part.
Another, in a pert and savage mood.
Without a reason, will condenni thee
quite,
And strive to quench thee in a para-
graph.
Another, with dishonest waggery,
Will twist, misquote, and utterly per-
vert
Thy thoughts and words; and hug
himself meanwhile
In the delusion, pleasant to his soul.
That thou art crushed, and he a gen-
tleman.
Another, with a specious fair pre-
tence.
Immaculately wise, will skim thy
book,
And, self-sufficient, from his desk
look down
With undisguised contempt on thee
and thine;
And sneer and snarl thee, from his
weekly court.
From an idea, spawn of his conceit.
That the best means to gain a great
renown
For wisdom is to sneer at all the
world.
With strong denial that a good ex-
ists ; —
That all is bad, imperfect, feeble,
stale.
Except this critic, who outshines
mankind.
Another, with a foolish zeal, will
prate
Of thy great excellence, and on thy
head
756
MAC KAY.
Heap epithet on epithet of praise
In terms preposterous, that thou wilt
blusli
To be so smothered with such ful-
some lies.
Another, calmer, with laudations
thin.
Unsavory and weak, will make it
seem
That his good-nature, not thy merit,
prompts
The baseless adidation of his pen.
Another, with a bulldog's bark, will
bay
Foul names against thee for some
fancied slight
Which thou ne'er dream' dst of, and
will damn thy work
For spite against the worker; while
the next.
Who thinks thy faith or politics a
crime.
Will bray displeasure from his month-
ly stall.
And prove thee dunce, that disagre'st
with him.
And, last of all, some solemn sage,
whose nod
'I'riraestral awes a world of little
wits.
Will carefully avoid to name thy
name.
Although thy words are in the mouths
of men.
And thy ideas in their inmost hearts,
Moulding events, and fashioning thy
time
To nobler efforts. Little matters
it!
Whate'er thou art, thy value will ap-
pear.
If thou art bad, no praise will buoy
thee up;
If thou art good, no censure weigh
thee down,
Nor silence nor neglect prevent thy
fame.
So fear not thou the critics! Speak
thy thought;
And, if thou'ri worthy, in the peo-
ple's love
Thy name shall live, while lasts thy
mother tonerue !
AT A CLUB-DINNER.
THE OLD FOGIES.
We merry three
Old fogies be;
The crow's-foot crawls, the wrinkle
comes.
Our heads grow bare
Of the bonnie brown hair.
Our teeth grow shaky in our gums.
Gone are the joys that once we knev/,
Over the green, and under the blue.
Our blood runs calm, as calm can be,
And we're old fogies — fogies three.
Yet if we be
Old fogies three
The life still pulses in our veins;
And if the heart
Be didled in part.
There's sober wisdom in oui- brains.
We may have heard that Hope's a
knave.
And Fame a breath beyond the grave.
But what of that — if wiser grown.
We make the passing day our own.
And find true joy where joy can be.
And live our lives, though fogies
three ?
Ay — though we be
Old fogies three.
We're not so dulled as not to dine;
And not so old
As to be cold
To wit, to beauty, and to wine.
Our hope is less, our memory more;
Our sunshine brilliant as of yore.
At four o'clock, 'twixt noon and
night,
'Tis warm as morning, and as bright.
And every age bears blessings free.
Though we're old fogies — fogies
three.
THE JOLl.V COMPANIONS.
Jolly companions! three times three I
Let us confess what fools we be !
We eat more dinner than hunger
craves.
We di'ink our passage to early graves.
And fill, and swill, till our foreheads
burst,
P''or sake of the wine, and not of th£:
thirst.
MAG KAY.
757
Jolly companions! three times three,
And wished I Tnight
Let us confess what fools we be !
Take sudden flight
And dine alone,
We toil and moil from morn to night,
Unseen, unknown.
Slaves and drudges in health's despite,
On a mutton chop and a hot potato,
Gathering and scraping painful gold
Reading my Homer, or my Plato.
To hold and garner till we're old;
And die, mayhap, in middle prime,
It conies to this.
Loveless, joyless, all our time.
The truest bliss
Jolly companions! three times three,
For great or small
Let us confess what fools we be!
Is free to all ;
Like the fresh air.
Or else we leave our warm fireside,
Like flowerets fair,
Friends and comrades, bairns and
Like night or day.
bride.
Like work or play;
To mingle in the world's affairs.
And books that charm or make us
And vex our souls with public cares;
wiser,
And have our motives misconstrued,
Are better comrades than a Kaiser.
Reviled, maligned, misunderstood.
Jolly companions! three times three,
Let us confess what fools we be !
THE GREAT CRITICS.
Whom shall we praise ?
HAPPIXESS.
Let's praise the dead!
In no men's ways
I'a'^e drunk good wine
Their heads they raise.
From Rhone and Rhine,
Nor strive for bread
And filled the glass
With you or me, —
To friend or lass
So, do you see ?
Mid jest and song.
We'll praise the dead!
The gay night long.
Let living men
And found the bowl
Dare but to claim
Inspired the soul.
From tongue or pen
With neither Avit nor wisdom richer
Their meed of fame.
Tlian comes from water in the pitcher.
We'll cry them down,
Spoil their renown.
I've ridden far
Deny their sense.
In coach and car,
Wit, eloquence.
Sped four-in-hand
Poetic tire,
Across the land ;
All they desire.
On gallant steed
Our say is said,
Have measured speed,
Long live the dead !
With the summer wind
That la'^^^ed behind*
Hut found more joy for days to-
gether
BE QUIET, do: —I'LL CALL MY
• n tramping o'er the mountain
MOTHER.
heather.
As I was sitting in a wood.
I've dined, long since,
Under an oak-tree's leafy cover.
With king and prince,
Musing in pleasant solitude,
In soleuui state.
Who should come by but John, my
Stiff and sedate;
lover!
75S
MACK AY.
He pressed my hand and kissed my
"But that," quoth he, and twirled
cheek;
his thumb.
Then, warmer growing, kissed tlie
So blithe he was, and free,
otlier,
" Is quite enough for happiness
Wliile I exclaimed, and strove to
For a little man like me."
shriek,
"jBe quiet, dol — Fll call my
And oft this little, very little,
mother '.''^
Happy little man.
Would talk a little to himself
He saw my anger was sincere,
About the great world's plan:
And lovingly began to chide me;
'• Though people think me V(m\
Then wiping from my cheek the
poor.
tear,
I feel I'm very glad.
He sat him on the grass beside
And this I'm sure could scarcely be
me,
If I were very bad.
He feigned such pretty amorous
Rich knaves who cannot rest o'
woe,
nights.
Breathed such sweet vows one after
At every turn I see.
other.
While cosy sleep unbidden comes
I could but smile, while whispering
To a quiet man like me.
low,
"2)e quiet, do! — I'' 11 call my
" For though I'm little, very little,
inoilter .'^'
Do whate'er I can,
Yet every morning when I shave.
He talked so long, and talked so
I shave an honest man ;
well.
And eveiy night when I go home,
And swore he meant not to deceive
My winsome little wife.
me;
Receives me smiling at the door.
I felt more grief than I can tell.
And loves me more than life: —
When with a sigh he rose to leave
And this is joy that kings them-
me.
selves.
" John ! "' said I; " and must thou
If thoughts were spoken free.
go?
Might give their sceptres to ex-
I love thee better than all other;
change
There is no need to hurry so, —
With a little man like me.
I never meant to cull my mother.'"
" And I've a little, quite a little.
Bonnie little child.
A little maid with golden hair.
THE LITTLE MAN.
And blue eyes bnght and mild ;
She sits and prattles on my knee,
There was a little, very little,
She's merry as a song,
Quiet little man.
She's pleasant as a ray of light,
He wore a little overcoat
She keeps my heart from wrong.
The color of the tan ;
And so, let kingdoms rise or fall,
And when his weekly Avage was earned
I'll earn my daily fee.
On Saturday, at night.
And think the world is good
He had but half-a-crown to spare
enough
To keep his spirits light;
For a little man like me."
MERRICK.
759
James Merrick.
THE CHAMELEON.
Two travellers of conceited cast,
As o'er Arabia's wilds they passed,
And, on their way, in friendly chat.
Now talked of this, and then of that.
Discoursed a while, 'mongst other
matter.
Of the chameleon's form and nature.
" A stranger animal," cries one,
" Sure never lived beneath the sun;
A lizard's body, lean and long;
A fish's head; a serpent's tongue;
Its foot with triple claw disjoined;
And what a length of tail behind !
How slow its pace ! and then its hue —
Who ever saw so fine a blue ? "
"Hold tliere," the other quick re-
plies ;
'"Tis green — I saw it with these
eyes,
As late with open mouth it lay,
And warmed it in the sunny ray ;
Stretched at its ease, the beast I
viewed,
And saw it eat the air for food."
" I've seen it, sir, as well as you,
And must again affirm it blue;
At leisure I the beast surveyed
Extended in the cooling shade."
"'Tis green, 'tis green, sir. I assure
ye."
"Green!" cries tlie other, in a fury:
" Why, sir. d'ye think I've lost my
eyes ? "
"'Twere no great loss," the friend
replies ;
" For if tliey always serve you thus,
You'll find them but of little use,"
So high at last the contest rose,
P^rom words they almost came to
blows ;
When luckily came by a third —
To him the question they referred ;
And begged he'd tell them, if lie
knew,
Whether the thing was green, or
blue ?
"Sirs," cried the umpire, "cease
your pother,
The creature's neither one nor
t'otlier;
I caught the animal last night.
And viewed it o'er by candle-light;
I marked it well — 'twas black as jet;
You stare! but, sirs, I've got it yet,
And can produce it." "Pray, sir,
do;
I'll lay my life the thing is blue."
" And I'll engage that, when you've
seen
The reptile, you'll pronounce him
green."
"Well, then, at once, to ease the
doubt,"
Eeplies the man, " I'll turn hlni out;
And, when before your eyes I've set
him,
If you don't find him black, I'll eat
him."
He said; tlien full before tlieir sight
Produced the beast, and lo — 'twas
white !
Botli stared ; the man looks wondrous
wise !
" My cliildren," the chameleon cries
(Then first the creature found a
tongue),
" You all are right, and all are
wrong;
When next you talk of wliat yoii
view,
Think others see as well as you ;
Nor wonder if you find that none
Prefers yom- eyesight to his owr..''
7t)0
MOORE.
Thomas Moore.
[From an Epistle to Samuel liogers.]
THE MODERN PUFFING SYSTEM.
I'.VLiKE those feeble gales of praise
W'liich critics blew in former days,
Our modern puffs are of a kind
That truly, really " raise the wind ; "'
And since they've fairly set in blow-
ing.
We find them the best trade-winds
going.
What storm is on the deep — and
more
Is the great power of Puff on shore,
Which jumps to glory's future tenses
Before the present even commences,
And makes " immortal " and "di-
vine" of us.
Before the workl has read one Ime of
us.
In old times when the god of song
Drew his own two-horse team along,
Carrying inside a bard or two
Booked for posterity " all through,"
Their luggage, a few close-packed
rhymes
(Like yours, my friend, for after-
times)
So slow the pull to Fame's abode
That folks oft slumbered on the road ;
And Homer's self sometimes, they
say.
Took to his nightcap on the way.
But now, how different is the story
With our new galloping sons of glory.
Who, scorning all such slack and
slow time.
Dash to posterity in no time!
Raise but one general blast of puff
To start your author — that's enough:
In vain the critics sit to watch him
Try at the starting-post to catch him ;
He's off — the putters carry it hol-
low —
The critics, if they please, may fol-
low;
Ere they've laid down their first po-
sitions,
He's fairly blown through six edi-
tions!
In vain doth Edinburgh dispense
Her blue-and-yellow pestilence
( That plague so awful in my time
To young and touchy sons of rhyme) ;
The Quarterly, at three months'
date.
To catch the Unread One comes too
late;
And nonsense, littered in a hurry,
Becomes " im.mortal " spite of Mur-
ray.
[From The Fiuhjc Familij in Paris].
EXTRACTS FROM MISS BIDDrS
LETTERS.
AViiAT a time since I wrote! — I'm a
sad naughty girl —
Though, like a tee-totum, I'm all in
a twirl,
Yet even (as you wittily say) a tee-
totum
Between all its twirls gives a letter
to note 'em.
But, Lord, such a place! and then,
Dolly, my dresses,
My gowns, so divine! — there's no
language expresses, •
Except just, the two words " su-
perbe," "magnifique,"
The trimmings of that which I had
home last week!
It is called — I forget — a la — some-
thing which sounded
IJke ulicampane — but, in truth, I'm
confounded
And bothered, my dear, 'twixt that
troublesome boy's
(Bob's) cookery language, and Ma-
dame Le Koi's:
What Avith fillets of roses, and fillets
of veal.
Things garni with lace, and things
rjarni with eel,
MOORE.
761
One's hair and one's cutlets both en
papillote.
And a thousand more things 1 sluill
ne'er have by rote,
1 can scarce tell the difference, at
least as to phrase,
Between beef a la Psi/clie and curls
o la braise, —
But, in short, dear, I'm tricked out
quite a la fran(;aise,
With my bonnet— so beautiful!— high
up and poking,
Like things that are put to keep
chiinneys from smoking.
Where slialll begin with the endless
delights
Of this Eden of milliners, monkeys,
and sights —
This dear busy place, where there's
nothing transacting.
But dresshig and dinnering, dancing
and acting '?
Last night, at the Beaujon, a place
where — I doubt
If 1 Avell can describe — there are
cars, that set out
From a lighted pavilion, high up in
the air,
And rattle you down, Doll — you
hardly know where.
These vehicles, mind me, in which
you go through
This delightfidly dangerous journey,
hold tico,
borne cavalier asks, with humility,
whether
You'll venture down with him —
you smile — 'tis a match;
In an instant you're seated, and down
both together
Go thmidering, as if you went post
to old Scratch!
Well, it was but last night, as I stood
and remarked
(_)u the looks and odd ways of the
girls who embarked.
The impatience of some for the peril-
ous flight.
The forced giggle of others, 'twixt
pleasure and fright.
That there came up — imagine, dear
Doll, if you can —
A fine, sallow, sublime, sort of Wer-
ter-faced man.
With nmstachios that gave (what we
we read of so oft)
The dear Corsair expression, half sav-
age, half soft,
As hyienas in love may be fancied to
look, or
A something between Abelard and
old Bhicher!
Up he came, Doll, to me, and uncov-
ering his head,
(Rather bald, but so warlike!) in bad
English said,
"Ah! my dear — if Ma'mselle vill be
so vei-y good —
Just for von'liUle course " — though
I scarce understood
What he wished me to do, I said,
thank him, I would.
Off we set — and, tliough 'faith, dear,
I hardly knew wliether
My head or my heels were the up-
permost then,
For 'twas like heaven and earth,
Dolly, coming together,—
Yet, spite of thedanger, Ave dared
it again.
And oh ! as I gazed on the features
and air
Of the man who for me all tliis
peril defied,
1 could fancy almost he and I m ere a
pair
Of unhappy young lovers,who thus,
side by side.
Were taking, instead of rope, pistol,
or dagger, a
Desperate dash down the falls of Ni-
agara !
Well, it isiiH the king, after all, my
dear creature!
But don't you go laugh, now—
there's nothing to quiz in't—
For grandeur of air and for grimness
of feature,
He might be a king, Doll, though,
hang him, he isn't.
At first I felt hurt, for I wished it, I
own,
If for no other cause than to vex Miss
Malone, —
rALMER.
(The great heiress, you know, of
Shandangan, who's here.
Showing off with such airs and a real
Casliniere,
While mine's but a paltry old rabbit-
skin, dear!)
But says Pa, after deeply considering
the thing,
"I am just as well pleased it should
not be the king;
As I think for my Biddy so gentille
and jolie,
Whose charms may their price in
an honest way fetch.
That a 13randenburg — (what is a
Brandenburg, Uolly ?) —
Would be, after all, no such very
great catch.
William Pitt Palmer.
THE SMACK IX SCHOOL.
A DISTRICT school, uot far away,
Mid Berkshire's hills, one winter's
day.
Was hunnningwith its wonted noise
Of threescore mingled girls and boys;
Some few upon their tasks intent.
But more on furtive mischief bent.
The while the master's downward
look
Was fastened on a copy-book ;
When suddenly, behind his back,
Rose sharp and clear a rousing smack !
As 't were a battery of bliss
Let off in one tremendous kiss!
" What's that ?" the startled master
cries;
" That, thir," a little imp replies,
'• Wath William Willith, if you
pleathe, —
I thaw him kith Thuthanna Peathe ! "
With frown to make a statue thrill.
The master thundered, "Hither,
Will!"
Like wretch o'ertaken in his track,
With stolen chattels on his back.
Will hung his head in fear and shame,
And to the awful presence came, —
A great, green, bashful simpleton,
The butt of all good-natured fun.
With smile suppressed, and birch
vipraised.
The thunderer faltered, — "I'm
amazed
That you, my biggest pupil, should
Be guilty of an act so rude !
Before the whole set school to boot —
What evil genius put you to 't '? "
"'Twas she herself, sir," sobbed the
lad;
" I did not mean to be so bad;
But when Susannah shook her curls.
And whispered, I was 'fraid of girls
And dursn't kiss a baby's doll,
I couldn't stand it, sir, at all.
But up and kissed her on the spot!
I know — boo-hoo — I ought to not.
But, somehow, from her looks —
boo-hoo —
I thought she kii-d o' wished me to ! "
Thomas William Parsons.
SA/XT PEHA y.
ADDRESSED TO II. T. P.
When to any saint I pray,
It shall be to Saint Peniy.
He alone, of all the brood,
Ever did me any good :
Many I have tried that are
Humbugs in the calendar.
On the Atlantic faint and sick,
Once I prayed to Saint Dominick:
He ^yas holy, sure, and wise ; —
Was't not he that did devise
Auto da Fes and rosaries '? —
But for one in my condition
This good saint was no physician.
Next in pleasant Normandie,
I made a prayer to Saint Denis,
In the great cathedral, where
All the ancient kings repose ;
But, how I was swindled there
At the "Golden Fleece," — he
knows !
In my wanderings, vague and vari-
ous,
Reaching Naples — as I lay
Watching Vesuvius from the bay,
I besoughtSaint Januarius.
But I was a fool to try him ;
Naught I said could liquefy him;
And I swear he did me wrong,
Keeping me shut up so long
In that pest-house, with obscene
Jews and Greeks and things un-
clean —
What need had I of quarantine?
In Sicily at least a score —
In Spain about as many more —
And in Rome almost as many
As tlie loves of Don Giovanni,
Did I pray to — sans reply ;
Devil take the tribe ! — said I,
Worn with travel, tired and lame.
To Assisi's walls I came:
Sad and full of homesick fancies,
I addressed me to Saint Francis :
But the Ijeggar never did
Any thing as he was bid.
Never gave me aught — but fleas —
Plenty liad I at Assise.
But in Provence, near Vaucluse,
Hard by the Rhone, 1 found a
saint
Gifted with a wondrous juice.
Potent for the worst complaint.
'Twas at Avignon tliat first —
In the witching time of thirst —
To my brain the knowledge came
Of this blessed Catholic's name;
Forty miles of dust that day
Made me welcome St. Peray.
Though till then I had not heard
Aught about him, ere a third
Of a litre passed my lips,
AH saints else were in eclipse.
For his gentle spirit glided
With such magic into mine.
That methought such bliss as I did.
Poet never di-ew from wine.
Rest he gave me, and refection.
Chastened hopes, calm retrospec-
tion,
Softened images of sorrow,
Bright forebodings for the morrow.
Charity for what is past.
Faith in something good at last.
Now, why should any almanac
The name of this good creature lack '?
Or wherefore should the breviary
Omit a saint so sage and merry ?
The pope himself should grant a day
Especially to Saint Peray.
But since no day hath been appointed
On purpose, by the Lord's anointed.
Let us not wait — we'll do him riglit;
Send round your bottles, Hal, — and
set your night.
John Pierpont.
WHITTLING.
The Yankee boy, before he's sent to
school,
Well knows the mysteries of that
magic tool,
Tlie pocket-knife. To that his wist-
fnl eye
Tnrns, while he hears his mother's
lullaby;
His hoarded cents he gladly gives to
get it,
Then leaves no stone unturned till he
can whet it;
And in the education of the lad
No little part tliat implement hath
liad.
His pocket-knife to the young whit-
tler brings
A growing knowledge of material
things.
Projectiles, music, and the sculptor's
art.
His cliestnut whistle and his shingle
cart,
His elder pop-gun with its hickory
rod,
Its sharp explosion and rebounding
wad.
His corn-stalk fiddle, and the deeper
tone
That murniuis from his pumpkin-
stalk troHd)one,
Conspire to teach the boy. To these
succeed
His bow, his arrow of a featliered
reed,
His windmill, raised the passing
breeze to win.
His water-wheel, that turns upon a
pin.
Or, if his father lives upon the sliore,
You'll see his ship, " beam ends upon
the floor,"
Full rigged, with raking masts, and
timbers staunch,
And waiting, near the wasli-tub, for
a launch.
Thus, by his genius and his jack-
knife driven
Ere long he'll solve you any problem
given;
Make any gimcrack, musical or
mute,
A plough, a couch, an organ, or a
flute ;
Make you a locomotive or a clock,
Cut a canal, or build a floating-
dock,
Or lead forth beauty from a marble
block; —
Make anything, in short, for sea or
sliore.
From a child's rattle to a seventy-
four ; —
Make it, said I? — Ay, when he un-
dertakes it,
He'll make the thing and tlie ma-
chine tliat makes it.
And when the tiling is made, —
whether it be
To move on earth, in air. or on the
sea;
Whether on water, o'er the waves to
glide.
Or, upon land to roll, revolve, or
slide;
Whether to whirl or jar, to strike or
ring.
Whether it be a piston or a spring.
Wheel, pulley, tube sonorous, wood
or brass.
The thing designed shall surely come
to pass ;
For, when his hand's upon it, you
may know
That there's go in it, and he'll make
it go.
POPE.
765
ALEXANDER POPE.
{From the Dunciad.]
DULLNESS.
In eldest time, ere mortals writ or
Ere Pallas 'issued from the Thvmder-
er's head,
Dullness o'er all possessed her ancient
right.
Daughter of Chaos and eternal Night :
Fate in their dotage this fair idiot
gave,
Gross as her sire, and as her mother
grave,
Laborious, heavy, busy, bold and
blind.
She ruled, in native anarchy, the
mind.
Still her old empire to restore she
tries.
For, born a goddess, Dullness never
dies.
How hints, like spawn, scarce quick
in embryo lie.
How new-born nonsense first is
taught to cry ;
Maggots half-formed in rhyme exact-
ly meet.
And learn to crawl upon poetic feet.
Here one poor word an hundred
clenches makes,
And ductile Dullness new meanders
takes ;
There motlev images her fancy strike,
Figures ill-pah-ed, and similes unlike.
She sees a mob of metaphors ad-
vance.
Pleased with the madness of the mazy
dance:
How Tragedy and Comedy embrace;
How Farce and Epic get a jumbled
race ;
How Time itself stands still at her
command.
Realms shift their place, and ocean
turns to land.
Here gay description Egypt glads
with showers,
Or gives to Zembla fruits, to Barca
flowers;
Glittering with ice here hoary hills
are seen.
There painted valleys of eternal
green,
In cold December fragrant chaplets
blow.
And heavy harvests nod beneath the
snow.
All these, and more, the cloud-
compelling queen
Beholds through fogs, that magnify
the scene :
She, tinselled o'er in robes of varying
hues.
With self-applause her wild creation
views;
Sees momentary monsters rise and
fall.
And with her own fool's-colors gilds
them all.
[From The Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot. Th<
Prologue to the Satires.]
AN AUTHOR'S COMPLAINT.
Shut, shut the door, good John!
fatigued, I said,
Tie up the knocker, say I'm sick, I'm
dead.
The Dog-star rages: nay, 'tis past a
doubt.
All Bedlam, or Parnassus, is let out :
Fire in each eye, and papers in each
hand,
They rave, recite, and madden round
the land.
What walls can guard me, or what
shades can hide ?
They pierce my thickets, through my
grot they glide,
By land, by water, they renew the
charge,
They stop the chariot, and they board
the bai'ge;
766
POPE.
No place is sacred, not the church is
free.
Even Sunday sliines no Sabbatli-day
to me :
Tlien from the Mint walks forth the
man of rhyme,
Happy to catch me, just at dinner-
time.
Is there a parson much be-mused
in beer,
A maudlin poetess, a rhyming peer,
A clerk, foredoomed his father's soul
to cross,
Who pens a stanza, when he should
engross ?
Is there, who, locked from ink and
paper, scrawls
With desperate charcoal round his
darkened walls ?
All fly to T wick' nam, and in humble
strain
Apply to me, to keep them mad or
vain.
Arthur, whose giddy son neglects the
laws,
Imputes to me and to my works the
cause :
Poor Cornus sees his frantic wife
elope.
And curses wit, and poetry, and
Pope.
Friend to my life! (which did
not you prolong.
The world had wanted many an idle
song)
AVhat drop or nostrum can this plague
remove ?
Or which must end me, a fool's wrath
or love ?
A dire dilemma! either way I'm
sped.
If foes, they write, — if friends, they
read me dead.
Seized and tied down to judge, how
wretched I!
Who can't be silent, and who will not
lie:
To laugh, were want of goodness and
of grace.
And to be grave, exceeds all power
of face.
I sit with sad civility, I read
With honest anguish and an aching
head ;
And drop at last,but in unwilling ears.
This saving counsel, "' Keep your
l)iece nine years."
Nine years! cries he, who high in
Drury Lane,
Lulled by soft zephyrs through the
broken pane.
Rhymes ere he wakes, and prints be-
fore Term ends.
Obliged by hunger, and request of
friends : •
" The piece, you think, is incorrect ?
Why, take it,
I'm all submission, what you'd have
it, make it."
Three things another's modest
wishes bound.
My friendship, and a prologue, and
ten pound.
Pitholeon sends to me: "Youknow
his Grace,
I want a patron ; ask him for a
place."
Pitholeon libelled me — "but here's
a letter
Informs you, sir, 'twas when he knew
no better.
Dare you refuse him ? Curl invites
to dine.
He'll Avrite a journal, or he'll turn
divine."
Bless me! a packet. — "'Tis a
stranger sues,
A virgin tragedy, an orphan muse."
If I dislike it, " Furies, death, and
rage!"
If I approve, " Commend It to the
stage."
There (tliank my stars) my whole
commission ends,
The players and I are, luckily, no
friends.
Fired that the house reject him,
" 'Sdeath, I'll print it.
And shame the fools — Your inter-
est, sir, with Lintot."
Lintot, dull rogue! will think your
price too much :
"Not, sir, if you revise it, and re-
touch."
All my demurs but double his at-
tacks ;
At last he whispers, " Do; and we go
snacks."
POPE.
767
Glad of a quarrel, straight I clap the
door,
Sir, let me see your works and you no
more.
'Tis sung, when Midas' ears began
to spring.
(Midas, a sacred person and a king,)
His very minister who spied them
first
(Some say his queen) was forced to
speak or burst.
And is not mine, my friend, a sorer
case,
When every coxcomb perks them in
my face ?
You think this cruel ? take it for a
rule.
No creature smarts so little as a fool.
Let peals of laughter, Codrus! round
thee break.
Thou unconcerned canst hear the
mighty crack :
Pit, box, and gallery in convulsions
hurled.
Thou standest unshook am-id a burst-
ing world.
Who shames a scribbler ? break one
cobweb through.
He spins the slight, self-pleasing
thread anew:
Destroy his fib, or sophistry, in vain.
The creature's at his dirty work
again.
Throned in the centre of his thin de-
signs.
Proud of a vast extent of flimsy lines!
Of all mad creatures, if the learned
are right.
It is the slaver kills, and not the bite.
A fool quite angry is quite innocent,
Alas! 'tis ten times worse when they
repent.
One dedicates in high heroic prose.
And ridicules beyond a hundred foes:
One from all Grub Street will my
fame defend.
And, more abusive, calls himself my
friend.
This prints my letters, that expects a
bribe,
And others roar aloud, "Subscribe,
subscribe."
There are, who to my person pay
their court:
I cough like Horace, and, though
lean, am short.
Ammon's great son one shoulder had
too high,
Such Ovid's nose, and "Sir! you
have an eye." —
Go on, obliging creatures, make me
see,
All that disgraced my betters, met in
me.
Say for my comfort, languishing in
bed,
"Just so immortal Maro held his
head:"
And when I die, be sure you let me
know
Great Homer died three thousand
years ago.
Why did 1 write ? what sin to me
imknown
Dipped me in ink, my parents', or
my own V
As yet a child, nor yet a fool to fame,
I lisped in numbers, for the numbers
came.
I left no calling for this idle trade,
No duty broke, no father disobeyed.
The muse but served to ease some
friend, not wife.
To help me through this long dis-
ease, my life :
To second, Aiibutiixot! thy art and
care.
And teach the being you preserved to
bear.
[From the Hope of the Lock.]
BELINDA.
And now, unveiled, the toilet
stands displayed,
Each silver vase in mystic order laid.
First, robed in white the nymph in-
tent adores.
With head uncovered, the cosmetic
powers.
A. heavenly image in the glass ap-
pears.
To that she bends, to that her eyes
she rears ;
768
POPE.
The inferior priestess, at her altar's
side.
Trembling begins the sacreil rites of
pride.
Unnumbered treasures ope at once,
and here
The various offerings of the world
appear ;
From each she nicely culls with curi-
ous toil,
And decks tl^e goddess with the glit-
tering spoil.
This casket India's glowing gems
unlocks,
And all Arabia breathes from yonder
box.
The tortoise here and elephant unite,
Transformed to combs, the speckled,
and the white.
Here files of pins extend their shining
rows.
Puffs, powders, patches, bibles, billet-
doux.
Now awful beauty puts on all its
ai ms :
The fair each moment rises in her
charms,
Repairs her smiles, awakens every
grace,
And calls forth all the wonders of
her face ;
Sees by degrees a purer blush arise,
And keener lightnings quicken in her
eyes.
The busy sylphs surround their dar-
ling care.
These set the head, and those divide
the hair,
Some fold the sleeve, whilst others
plait the gown;
And Betty's praised for labors not
her own.
Not with more glories, in the ethe-
real plain,
The sun first rises o'er the purpled
main.
Than, issuing forth, the rival of his
beams
Launched on the bosom of the silver
Thames.
Fair nymphs and well-dressed youths
around her shone.
But every eve was fixed on her alone.
On her white breast a sparkling cross
she wore,
Which Jews might kiss, and infidels
adore.
Her lively looks a sprightly mind dis-
close,
Quick as her eyes and as unfixed as
those :
Favors to none, to all she smiles ex-
tends ;
Oft she rejects, but never once of-
fends.
Bright as the sun, her eyes the gazers
strike.
And like the sun, they shine on all
alike.
Yet graceful ease, and sweetness void
of pride.
Might hide her faults if belles had
faults to hide:
If to her share some female errors
fall.
Look on her face aud you'll forget
them all.
This nymph, to the destruction
of mankind,
Nourished two locks which graceful
hung behind
In equal curls, and well conspired to
deck
With shining ringlets the smooth
ivory neck.
Love in these labyrinths his slaves
detains
And mighty hearts are held in slen-
der chains.
With hairy springes we the birds be-
tray,
Slight lines of hair surprise the finny
prey.
Fair tresses man's imperial race en-
snare.
And beauty draws us with a single
hair.
[From the Rape of the Lock.']
MERIT BEYOND BEAUTY.
Say, why are beauties praised and
honored most,
The wise man's passion, and the vain
man's toast ?
Wliy decked with all that land and
» sea afford.
Why angels called, and angel-like
adored ?
Why round our coaches crowd the
white-gloved beaux,
AVhy bows the side-box from its in-
most rows ?
How vain are all these glories, all our
pains,
I'nless good sense preserve what
beauty gains:
That men may say, when we the
front-box grace.
Behold the first in virtue as in
face!
Oh! if to dance all night, and dress
all day.
Charmed the small-pox, or chased old
age away ;
Who would not scorn what house-
wife's cares produce.
Or who would learn one earthly thing
of use ?
To patch, nay, ogle, might become a
saint,
Nor could it sure be such a sin to
paint. |cay,
But since, alas I frail beauty must de-
Curled or uncurled, since locks will
turn to gray ;
Since, painted or not painted, all
shall fade,
And she who scorns a man must die
a maid;
What then remains but well our pow-
er to use.
And keep good-humor still whate'er
we lose ?
And trust me, dear! good-humor can
prevail.
When airs, and flights, and screams,
and scolding fail;
Beauties in vain their pretty eyes
may roll;
Charms strike the sight, but merit
wins the soul.
WiNTHROP MaCKWORTH PRAED.
THE BELLE OF THE BALL.
Years, years ago, ere yet my dreams
Had been of being wise or witty.
Ere 1 had done with writing themes,
Or yawned o'er this infernal Chit-
ty,-
"i ears, years ago, while all my joys
AVere in my fowling-piece and filly;
In short, while I was yet a boy,
I fell in love with Laura Lilly.
I saw her at the country ball :
There, when the sounds of flute and
fiddle
Gave signal sweet in that old hall
Of hands across and down the mid-
dle.
Hers w^as the subtlest spell by far
Of all that sets young hearts ro-
mancing:
She was our queen, our rose, our
star ;
And then she danced, — O Heaven !
her dancing.
Dark Avas her hair; her hand \\as
white;
Her voice was exquisitely tender;
Her eyes were full of liquid light;
I never saw a waist so slender;
Her every look, her every smile.
Shot right and left a score of ar-
rows :
I thought 't was Venus fiom her
isle.
And wondered \vhere she'd left her
sparrows.
She talked of politics or prayers.
Of Southey's prose or Words-
worth's sonnets.
Of danglers or of dancing bears.
Of battles or the last new bonnets:
By candle-light, at twelve o'clock. —
To me it mattered not a tittle, —
If those bright lips had quoted
Locke,
I might liave thought they nnn--
mured Little.
770
PRAED.
Through sunny May, through sultry
June,
I loved her with a love eternal;
I spoke her praises to the moon,
I wrote them to the ."Sunday Jour-
nal.
My mother laughed; 1 soon found
out
That ancient ladies have no feel-
ing:
My father frowned ; but how should
gout
See any happiness in kneeling ?
She was the daughter of a dean, —
Rich, fat, and rather apoplectic;
She had one brother just thirteen.
Whose color was extremely hectic;
Her grandmother for many a year
Had fed the parish with her boun-
ty;
Her second cousin was a peer.
And lord-lieutenant of the county.
But titles and the three-per-cents,
And mortgages and great relations,
And India bonds, and tithes and
rents,
O, what are they to love's sensa-
tions ?
Black eyes, fair forehead, clustering
locks, —
Such wealth, such honors, Cupid
chooses;
He cares as little for the stocks
As Baron Rothschild for the
Muses.
She sketched; the vale, the wood, the
beach,
Grew lovelier from her pencil's
shading:
She botanized; I envied each
Young blossom in her boudoir
fading:
She warbled Handel ; it was grand, —
She made the Catilina jealous :
She touched the organ ; I could
stand
For hours and hours to blow the
bellows.
She kept an album too, at home,
Well filled with all an albnm's
glories, —
Paintings of butterflies and Rome,
Patterns for trinnnings, Persian
stories,
Soft songs to Julia's cockatoo.
Fierce odes to famine and to
slaughter.
And autographs of Prince Leboo,
And recipes for elder-water.
And she was flattered, worshipped,
bored ;
Her steps were watched, her dress
was noted ;
Her poodle-dog was quite adored ;
Her sayings were extremely quoted.
She laughed, — and every heart was
glad.
As if the taxes were abolished;
She frowned, — and every look was
sad.
As if the opera were demolished.
She smiled on many just for
fun, —
I knew that there was nothing in
it;
I was the first, the only one,
Her heart had thought of for a
minute.
I knew it, for she told me so.
In phrase which Mas divinely
moulded ;
She wrote a charming hand, — and
oh.
How sweetly all her notes were
folded!
Our love was most like other loves. —
A little glow, a little shiver,
A rosebud and a pair of gloves.
And "Fly Not Yet'"' upon the
river ;
Some jealousy of some one's heir,
Some hopes of dying broken-
hearted ;
A miniature, a lock of hair,
The usual vom's, — and then we
parted.
PRAED.
771
We parted : months ami years rolled
by:
We met again four summers after.
Our parting was all sob and sigh,
Our meeting was all mirth and
laughter !
For in my heart's most secret cell
There had been many other lodg-
ers;
And she M'as not the ball-room's
belle,
But only Mrs. — Something — Rog-
ers I
QUINCE.
Neah a small village in the West,
Where many very Avorthy people
Eat, drink, play Avhist, and do their
best
To guard from evil, church and
steeple.
There stood — alas, it stands no
more I —
A tenement of brick and plaster.
Of which, for forty years and four.
My good friend Quince was lord
and master.
Welcome was he in hut and hall.
To maids and matrons, i^eers and
peasants;
He won the sympathies of all
By making puns and making pres-
ents.
Though all the parish was at strife.
He kept his counsel and his car-
riage.
And laughed, and loved a quiet life.
And shrunk from Chancery-suits
and marriage.
Sound were his claret and his head,
Warm were his double ale and
feelings ;
His partners at the whist-club said
That he was faultless in his deal-
ings.
He went to church but once a week.
Yet Dr. Poundtext always found
him
An upright man, who studied Greek,
And liked to see his friends around
him.
Asylums, hospitals, and schools
He used to swear were made to
cozen ;
All who subscribed to them were
fools —
And he subscribed to half a dozen.
It was his doctrine that the poor
Were always able, never willing;
And so the beggar at the door
Had first abuse, and then a shilling.
Some public principles he had.
But was no flatterer nor fretter;
He rapped his box when things were
bad.
And said: '' I cannot make them
better."
And much he loathed the imtriofs
snort.
And much he scorned the place-
man's snutfle,
And cut the fiercest quarrels short
With, "Patience, gentlemen, and
shuffle!"
For full ten years his pointer.
Speed,
Had couched beneath his masters
table,
For twice ten years his old white
steed
Had fattened in his master's stable.
Old Quince averred upon his troth
They were the ugliest beasts in
Devon ;
And none knew why he fed them
both
With his own hands, six days in
seven.
Whene'er they heard his ring or
knock.
Quicker than thought the village
slatterns
Flung down the novel, smoothed the
frock.
And took up Mrs. Glasse or pat-
terns.
Alice was studying baker's bills;
Louisa looked the queen of knit-
ters;
Jane happened to be hemming frills;
And Nell by chance was making
fritters.
PRIOR.
But all was vain. And while decay
Came like a tranquil moonlight
o'er him,
And found him gouty still and gay,
With no fair nurse to bless or bore
him;
His rugged smile and easy chair.
His dread of matrimonial lectures,
His wig, his stick, his powdered hair
Were themes for very grave con jec-
tures.
Some sages thought the stars above
Had crazed him with excess of
knowledge ;
Some heard he had been crossed in
love
Before he came away from college:
Some darkly hinted that His Grace
Did nothing, great or small, with-
out him;
Some whispered, with a solemn face.
That there was something odd
about him.
I foiuid him at threescore and ten
A single man, but bent quite dou-
ble;
Sickness was coming on him then
To take him from a world of trou-
ble.
He prosed of sliding down the hill,
Discovered he grew older daily;
One frosty day he made his will.
The next he sent for Dr. Baillie.
And so he lived, and so he died;
When last I sat beside his pillow.
He shook my hand: "Ah me!" he
cried,
" Penelope nuist wear the willow!
Tell her I hugged her rosy chain
While life was flickering in the
socket.
And say that when I call again
I'll bring a license in my pocket.
" I've left my house and grounds to
Fag-
I hope his master's shoes will suit
him! —
And I' ve bequeathed to you my
nag.
To feed him for my sake, or shoot
him.
The vicar's wife will take old Fox,
She'll find him an unconnnon
mouser;
And let her husband have my box.
My Bible and my Assmanshauser,
" Whether I ought to die or not
My doctors cannot quite determine ;
It's only clear that I shall rot.
And be, like Priam, food for ver-
min.
My debts are paid. But Nature's
debt
Almost escaped my recollection !
Tom, we shall meet again; and yet
I cannot leave you my direction ! "
Matthew Prior.
FOR MY OWN MONUMEXT.
As doctors give physic by way of
prevention,
Matt, alive and in health, of his
tombstone took care:
For delays are imsafe, and his pious
intention (heir.
May haply be never fulfilled by his
Then take Matt's word for it, the
sculptor is paid ,
That the figure is fine, pray believe
your own eye;
Yet credit but lightly what more may
be said.
For we flatter ourselves, and teach
marble to lie.
Yet counting so far as to fifty his
years.
His virtues and vices were as other
men's are;
High hopes he conceived, and he
smothered great fears.
In a life party-colored, half pleas-
lu'e, half care.
Nor to business a drudge, nor to fac-
tion a slave,
lie strove to make int'rest and
freedom agree;
In public employments industrious
and grave,
And alone with his friends, Lord !
how merry was he.
Now in equipage stately, now humbly
on foot,
Both fortunes he tried, but to
neither would trust;
And whirled in the round as the
wheel tm-ned about,
He found riches had wings, and
knew man was but dust.
This verse, little polished, though
mighty sincere.
Sets neither his titles nor merits to
view;
It says that his relics collected lie
here,
And no mortal yet knows if this
may be true.
Fierce robbers there are that infest
the highway,
So Matt may be killed, and his
bones never found;
False witness at court, and fierce tem-
pests at sea.
So Matt may yet chance to be
hanged or be drowned.
If his bones lie in earth, roll in sea,
fly in air,
To Fate we must yield, and the
thing is the same;
And if passing thou giv'st him a
smile or a tear,
He cares not — yet, prithee, be kind
to his fame.
AX EPITAPH.
Interukd beneath this marble stone
Lie sauntering Jack and idle Joan.
While rolling threescore years and one
Did round this globe their courses run ;
If human things went ill or well.
If changing empires rose or fell,
The morning past, the evening came.
And found this couple j List the same.
They walked and ate, good folks:
What then ?
Why, then they walked and ate again ;
They soundly slept the night away;
They did just nothing all the day.
Nor sister either had nor brother;
They seemed just tallied for each
other.
Their moral and economy
Most perfectly they made agree ;
Each virtue kept its proper bound.
Nor trespassed on the other's ground.
Nor fame nor censure they regarded;
They neither punished nor rewarded.
He cared not what the footman did;
Her maids she neither i:>raised nor
chid :
So every servant took his course,
And, bad at first, they all grew Avorse,
Slothful disorder tilled his stable.
And sluttish plenty decked her table.
Their beer was strong, their wine was
port ;
Their meal was large, their grace was
short.
They gave the poor the remnant meat.
Just when it grew not fit to eat.
They paid the church and parish rate,
And took, but read not, the receipt;
For which they claimed their Sun-
day's due.
Of sknnbering in an upper pew.
No man's defects sought they to
know,
So never made themselves a foe.
No man's good deeds did they com-
mend.
So never raised themselves a friend.
Nor cherished they relations poor.
That might decrease their present
store ;
Nor bai'u nor house did they repair.
That might oblige their future heir.
They neither added nor confounded ;
They neither wanted nor abounded.
Nor tear nor smile did they employ
At news of grief or public joy.
When bells were rung and bonfires
made
If asked, they ne'er denied their aid;
Their jug was to the ringers carried,
AVhoever either died or married.
774
PRIOR.
Their billet at the fire was found,
Whoever was deposed or crowned.
Nor good, nor bad, nor fools, nor
wise.
They Avould not learn, nor could
advise ;
AVithout love, hatred, joy, or fear,
Tliey led — a kind of — as it Mere;
Nor wislied, nor cared, nor laughed,
nor cried,
And so they lived, and so they died.
FROM
THE THIEF AND THE
COnDELIER."
'' What frightens you thus, my good
son '?" says the i)riest;
" You murdered, are sorry, and have
been confessed."
"O fatlier! my sorrow will scarce
save my bacon ;
For 'twas not that I murdered, but
that I was taken."
" Pooh, prithee ne'er trouble thy head
with such fancies ;
Rely on the aid you shall have from
St. Francis;
If the money you promised be brought
to the chest.
You have only to die; let the church
do the rest."
" And what will folks say, if they see
you afraid ?
It reflects upon me, as I knew not my
trade.
Courage, friend, for to-day is your
period of sorrow;
And things will go better, believe me,
to-morrow."
" To-morrow!" our hero replied in a
fright;
"He that's hanged before noon,
ought to think of to-night."
" Tell your beads," quoth the priest,
" and be fairly trussed up.
For you surely to-night shall in Para-
dise sup."
" Alas ! " quoth the 'squire, " howe'er
sumptuous the treat,
Parbleu ! I shall have little stomach
to eat ;
I should therefore esteem it great
favor and grace.
Would you be so kind as to go in my
place."
"That I would," quoth the father,
' ' and thank you to boot ;
But our actions, you know, with our
duty must suit;
The feast I proposed to you, I cannot
taste,
For this night, by our order, is marked
for a fast."
[From Alma.]
RICHARD'S THEORY OF THE MIND.
I SAY, whatever you maintain
Of Alma in the heart or brain.
The plainest man alive may tell ye
Her seat of empire is the belly.
From hence she sends out those sup-
plies.
Which make us either stout or
wise :
Your stomach makes the fabric roll
Just as the bias rules the bowl.
The great Achilles might employ
The strength designed to ruin Troy;
He dined on lion's marrow, spread
On toasts of ammunition bread ;
But, by his mother sent away
Amongst the Thracian ghis to play,
Effeminate he sat and (fuiet —
Strange product of a cheese-cake
diet!
Ol)serve the various operations
Of food and drink in several nations.
Was ever Tartar fierce or cruel
Upon the strength of Avater gruel ?
But who shall stand his rage or force
If first he rides, then eats iiis horse?
Salads, and eggs, and lighter fare
Tune the Italian spark's guitar:
And, if I take Dan Congreve right,
Pudding and beef make Bi-itons
fight.
John Godfrey Saxe.
irOlV CYRUS LAID THE CABLE.
Come, listen all unto my song
It is no silly fable ;
'Tis all about the mighty cord
They call the Atlantic Cable.
Bold Cyrus Field, he said, says he,
I have a pretty notion
That 1 can run a telegraph
Across the Atlantic Ocean.
Then all the people laughed, and said,
They'd like to see him do it;
He might get half-seas over, but
He never could get through it :
To carry out his foolish plan
He never would be able;
He might as well go hang himself
With his Atlantic Cable.
But Cyrus was a valiant man,
A fellow of decision:
And heeded not their mocking words,
Their laughter and derision.
Twice did his bravest efforts fail.
And yet his mind was stable;
He wa'n't the man to break his heart
Because he broke his cable.
'•Once more, my gallant boys!" he
cried ;
'■'Three times! —you know the
fable, —
(I'll make it thirty,'" muttered he,
"But I will lay the cable!")
Once more they tried, — hurrah !
hurrah !
What means this great commotion?
The Lord be praised! the cable's laid
Across the Atlantic Ocean!
Loud rang the bells, — for flashing
through
Six hundred leagues of water,
Old Mother England's Ix-nison
ISalutes her eldest daughter!
O'er all the land the tidings speed.
And soon, in every nation.
They'll hear aljout the cable with
Profoundest admiration !
Xow long live President and Queen;
And long live gallant Cyrus;
And may his. courage, faith, and zeal
With euudation fire us ;
And may we honor evermore
The manly, bold, and stable ;
And tell our sons, to make them
brave.
How Cyrus laid the cable !
THE SUPERFLUOUS MAN.
I LONG have been puzzled to guess,
And so I have frequently said.
What the reason could really be
That I never have happened to
wed ;
But now it is perfectly clear,
I am under a natural ban ;
The girls are already assigned, —
And I'm a superfluous man !
Those clever statistical chaps
Declare the numerical run
Of women and men in the world,
Is twenty to twenty-and-one ;
And hence in the pairing, you see,
Since wooing and wedding began.
For every connubial score,
They've got a superfluous man!
By twenties and twenties they go.
And giddily rush to their fate.
For none of the number, of course.
Can fail of a conjugal mate ;
But while they are yielding in scores
To Nature's inflexible plan.
There's never a woman for me, —
For I'm a superfluous man!
It isn't that I am a churl.
To solitude over-inclined;
SAXE.
It isn't that I am at fault
In morals or manners or mind :
Then wluit is the reason, you ask,
Tm still with the bachelor-clan '?
I merely w as numbered amiss, —
And I'm a supertluous man!
It isn't that I am in want
Of personal beauty or grace,
For many a man with a wife
Is uglier far in the face;
Indeed, among elegant men
I fancy myself in tlie van ;
But what is the value of that.
When I'm a superfluous man ?
Although I am fond of the girls,
For aught I could ever discern
The tender emotion I feel
Is one that they never return;
'Tis idle to quarrel with fate!
For, struggle as hard as I can,
They're mated already, you know, —
And I'm a superfluous man!
No wonder I grumble at times.
With women so pretty and plenty,
To know that I never was born
To figure as one of the twenty ;
But yet, when the avei-age lot
With critical vision I scan,
I think it may be for tlie best
That I'm a superfluous man!
r/IE PUZZLED CEXSUS-TAKER.
" Got any boys ? " the Marshal said
To a lady from over the Rhine;
And the lady shook her flaxen head,
And civilly answered "iVe/u /*
" Got any girls ?" the Marshal said
To the lady from over the Khine;
And again the lady shook her head,
Ami civilly answered, "A^'eia.'"
'• But some are dead ?" the Marshal
said.
To the lady from over the Rhine;
Aud again tlie lady shook her head.
And civilly answered, ^'Nein ! "
• .V('(», pronounced iiine, is the German
tor "No."
'•■ Husband, of course ? " the Marshal
said
To the lady from over the Rhine ;
And again she shook her flaxen head.
And civilly answered, "iVe/u .' "
" The devil you have!'' the Marshal
said
To the lady from over the Rhine :
And again she shook her flaxen head.
And civilly answered, ''^Ve/H .' "
" Now what do you mean by shaking
your head,
And always answering, 'Nine' ?"
'■'■ Icli kann nicht Jiiu/llsch."^ civilly
said
The lady from over the Rhine.
SOJ^G OF SARATOGA.
" Pray, what do they do at the
Springs ?"
The question is easy to ask;
But to answer it fully, my dear,
Were rather a serious task.
And yet, in a bantering way.
As the magpie or mocking-bird
sings,
I'll venture a bit of a song
To tell what they do at the Springs !
Iin})rimis, my darling, they drink
The waters so sparkling and clear;
Though the flavor is none of the best,
And the odor exceedingly queer;
But the fluid is mingled, you know.
With wholesome medicinal things,
So they drink, and they drink, and
they drink, —
And that's what they do at the
Springs !
Then with appetites keen as a knife.
They hasten to l)reakfast or dine
(The latter precisely at three.
The former from seven till nine. )
Ye gods! what a rustle and rush
When the eloquent dimier-bell
rings ! •
Then they eat, and they eat, and they
eat, —
And that's what they do at the
Springs !
Now they stroll in the beautiful
walks.
Or loll in the shade of the trees :
Where many a whisper is heard
That never is told by the breeze;
And hands are counningled with
hands,
Regardless of conjugal rings;
And they flirt, and they-flirt, and they
flirt,—
And that's what they do at the
Springs !
The drawing-rooms now are ablaze,
And nuisic is shrieking away;
Terpsichore governs the hour.
And Fashion was never so gay !
An arm round a tapering waist,
How closely and fondly it clings!
So they waltz, and they waltz, and
they waltz, —
And that's what they do at the
Springs !
In short — as it goes in the world —
They eat, and they drink, and they
sleep ;
They talk, and they walk, and they
woo ;
They sigh, and they laugh, and
they \\eep ;
They read, and they ride, and they
dance;
(With other unspeakable things;)
They pray, and they play, and they
pay, —
And that's what they do at the
Springs !
EARL Y niSlNG.
" God bless the man who first in-
vented sleep ' '
So Sancho Panza said, and so say I:
And bless him, also, that he didn't
keej)
Hi% great discovery to himself; nor
try
To make it — as the lucky fellow
might —
A close monopoly by patent-right!
Yes ; bless the man who first invented
sleep
(I really can't avoid the iteration);
But blast the man with curses loud
and deep,
Whate'er the rascal's name, or age,
or station.
Who first invented, and went round
advising,
That artificial cut-off, — Early Risiug.
"Rise with the lark, and with the
lark to bed,"
Observes some solemn, sentimental
owl ;
Maxims like these are very cheaply
said;
But, ere you make yourself a fool
or fowl.
Pray just inquire about his rise anil
fall.
And whether larks have any beds
at all !
The time for honest folks to be abed
Is in the morning, if I reason right:
And he who cannot keep his precious
heail
Upon the pillow till it's fairly light.
And so enjoy his forty morning
winks.
Is up to knavery ; or else — he drinks.
Thomson, who sang about the " Sea-
sons," said
It was a glorious thing to rist in
season ;
But then he said it — lying — in his
bed,
At ten o'clock, A. M., — the very
reason
He wrote so charmingly. The simple
fact is.
His preaching wasn't sanctioned by
his practice.
'Tis, doubtless, Mell to be sometimes
awake, —
Awake to duty, and awake to
truth, —
But when, alas! a nice review we
take
Of our best deeds and days, we
find, in sooth.
778
SAXE.
The hours that leave the slightest
cause to weep
Are those we passed in childhood or
asleep !
' Tis beautiful to leave the world
awhile
For the soft visions of the gentle
night;
And free, at last, from mortal care or
guile.
To live as only in the angels' sight,
In sleep's sweet realm so cosily shut
in,
Where, at the worst, we only dream
of sin!
So let us sleep, and give the Maker
pi'aise.
I like the lad, who, when his father
thought
To clip his morning nap by hack-
neyed phrase
Of vagrant worm by early songster
caught.
Cried, '' Served him right! — it's not
at all surprising;
The worm was punished, sir, for
early rising! "
ABOUT HUSBANDS.
"A jnan is, in general, better pleased
when he has a good dinner upon his table,
than when his wife speaks Greek."— Sam.
Joiixsox.
Johnson was right. I don't agree to
all
The solenm dogmas of the rough
old stager;
But very much approve what one
may call
The minor morals of the "Ursa
Major."
Johnson was right. Although some
men adore
Wisdom in woman, and with learn-
ing cram her,
There isn't one in ten but thinks far
more
Of his own grub than of his
spouse's grammar.
I know it is the greatest shame in life ;
But who among them (save, per-
haps, myself)
Returning hungry home, but asks his
wife
What beef — not books — she has
upon the shelf ?
Though Greelj and I^atin l)e the lady's
boast,
They're little valued by her loving
mate;
The kind of tongue that husbands
relish most
Is modern, boiled, and served upon
a plate.
Or if, as fond ambition may com-
mand.
Some home-made verse the happy
matron show him.
What mortal spouse but from her
dainty hand
Woukl sooner see a pudding than a
poem ?
Young lady, — deep in love with Tom
or Harry, —
'Tis sad to tell you such a tale as
this ;
But here's the moral of it: Do not
marry;
Or, marrying, take your lover as
he is, —
A very man, — with something of the
brute
(Unless he prove a sentimental
noddy).
With passions strong and appetite to
boot,
A thirsty soul within a hungry
bodv.
Avery man, — not one of nature's
clods, —
With hiunan failings, whether saint
or sinner; •
Endowed, perhaps, with genius from
the gods,
But apt to take his temper from his
dinner.
SAXE.
779
UAILROAD RHYME.
.SiNGiXG through the forests,
Kattling over ridges;
Shooting under arches,
liumbUng over bridges;
Wliizzing through the mountains,
Buzzing o'er the vale, —
Bless me! this is pleasant,
Hiding on the rail !
Men of different " stations "
In the eye' of fame.
Here are very quickly
Coming to the same;
High and lowly people,
Birds of every feather,
On a common level.
Travelling together.
Gentleman in shorts,
Looming very tall;
Gentleman at large
Talking very small;
Gentleman in tights.
With a loose-ish mien;
Gentleman in gray,
Looking rather green;
Gentleman quite old.
Asking for the news;
Gentleman in black,
In a fit of blues ;
Gentleman in claret.
Sober as a vicar;
Gentleman in t^veed,
Dreadfully in liquor!
Stranger on the right
Looking very sunny,
Obviotisly reading
Something rather funny.
Xow the smiles are thicker, —
Wonder Mhat they mean !
Faith, he's got the Knicker-
Bocker Magazine!
Stranger on the left
Closing up his peepers;
Xow he snores amain,
Like the Seven Sleepers;
At his feet a volume
Gives the explanation.
How the man grew stupid
From "Association."
Ancient maiden lady
Anxiously remarks,
That there nuist be peril
'Mong so many sparks;
Eoguish-looking fellow,
Turning to the stranger,
Says it's his opinion
She is out of danger!
Woman with her baby,
Sitting vis-a-vis;
Baby keeps a-squalllng.
Woman looks at me ;
Asks about the distance.
Says it's tiresome talking,
Xoises of the cars
Are so very shocking!
Market-woman, careful
Of the precious casket,
Knowing eggs are eggs.
Tiglitly holds her basket ,
Feeling that a smash.
If it came, would surely
Send her eggs to pot.
Bather prematurely.
Singing through the forests.
Battling over ridges;
Shooting under arches,
Bumbling over bridges ;
Whizzing through the mountains.
Buzzing o'er the vale, —
Bless me! this is pleasant,
Biding on the rail!
THE FAMILY MAX.
I ONCE was a jolly young beau.
And knew how to pick up a fan.
But I've done with all that, you must
know.
For now I'm a family man !
When a partner I ventured to take,
The ladies all favored the plan ;
They owned I was certain to make
" Such an excellent faanily man! "
If I travel by land or by water,
I have charge of some Susan or
Ann;
Mrs. Brown is so sure that her daugh- j Young people must have an exem-
ter
Is safe with a family man !
plar.
And I am a family man !
The trunks and tlie bandboxes round The club-men I meet in the city
'em All treat me as well as they can,
^Vlthsomothing like horror I scan, | And only exclaim, " What a pity
]5ut thouii'li 1 may mutter '"Confound
'em!''
I smile — like a family man !
I once was as gay as a templar,
But levity's now under ban;
Poor Tom is a family man ! ' '
I own I am getting quite pensive ;
Ten cluldren, from David to Dan,
Is a family rather extensive ;
But then — I'm a family man !
Richard Henry Stoddard.
THE MISTAKE.
He saw in sight of liis house.
At dusk, as stories tell,
A Avoman picking mulberries,
And he liked her looks riglit well.
He struggled out of his chair,
And began to beclvon and call;
But slie went on picking nuilberries,
Xor looked at him at all.
" If Famine should follow you.
He would find the harvest in;
You think yourself and your mulber-
ries
Too good for a mandarin.
I have yellow gold in my sleeve. "
But she answered, sharp and bold,
" Be off! Let me pick my mulberries,
I am bought witli no man's gold. "
Slie scratched his face with her nails,
Till he turned and fled for life,
For the lady picking nudberries
Was his true and virtuous wife !
TOO OLD FOI! KISSES.
My uncle Pliilip, hale old man,
Has children by the dozen;
Tom, Ned, and jack, and Kate and
Ann —
How many call me '"Cousin '?''
Good boys and girls, the best was
Bess,
I bore her on my shoulder;
A little bud of loveliness
That never should grow older!
Her eyes had such a pleading M"ay.
They seemed to say, '" Don't strike
me. "
Then, growing bold another day,
'" I mean to make you like me. "
I liked my cousin, early, late.
Who liked not little misses:
She used to meet me at the gate,
Just old enough for kisses !
This was, I think, three years ago.
Before I went to college :
I learned but one thing — liow to
row,
A healthy sort of knowledge.
When I was plucked, (we won the
race, )
And all was at an end there,
I thought of Uncle Philip's place,
And every country friend there.
My cousin met me at the gate.
She looked five, ten years older,
A tall young woman, still, sedate,
With manners coyer, colder.
She gave her hand with stately
pride.
" Why, what a greeting this is!
You used to kiss me." She replied,
'" I am too old for kisses."
I loved — I loved my Cousin Bess,
She's always in my mind now;
A full-blown bud of loveliness.
The rose of womankind now !
She must have suitors ; old and young
Must bow their heads before her;
Vows must be made, and songs be
sung
By many a mad adorer.
But I must win her: she must give
To me her youth and beauty ;
And I — to love her while I live
Will be my happy duty.
For she will love me soon or late,
And be my bliss of blisses.
Will come to meet me at the gate,
Nor be too old for kisses '■
THE MARRIAGE KNOT.
I KNOW a bright and beauteous May,
Who knows I love her well ;
But if she loves, or will some day,
I cannot make her tell.
She sings the songs I write for her.
Of tender hearts betrayed ;
But not the one that I prefer.
About a country maid.
The hour when I its burden hear
Will never be forgot :
" O stay not long, but come, my dear,
And knit our marriage knot! "
It is about a country maid —
I see her in my mind;
She is not of her love afraid,
And cannot be unkind.
She knits, and sings with many a
sigh,
And, as her needles glide.
She wishes, and she wonders why
He is not at her side.
" He promised he would meet me
here,
Upon this very spot :
O stay not long, but come, my dear.
And knit our marriage knot! "
My lady will not sing the song;
" Wliy not ? " I say. And she.
Tossing her head, "it is too long."
Andl, " Too short, may be."
She has her little wilful ways,
But I persist, and then,
" It is not maidenly," she says,
" For maids to sigh for men."
''But men must sigh for maids, I
fear,
I know it is my lot.
Until you whisper, ' Come, my dear,
And knit our marriage knot!' "
Why is my little one so coy ?
Why does she use me so '?
I am no fond and foolish boy
To lightly come and go.
A man'who loves, I know my heart.
And will know hers ere long.
For, certes, I will not depart
Until she sings my song.
She learned it all, as you shall hear.
No word has she forgot.
"Begin, my dearest." "Come, my
dear.
And knit our marriage knot ! "
Jonathan Swift.
FROM
VERSE ff OX HIS OU'.V
DEATHS
Some great misfortune to portend
No enemy can match a friend.
With all the kindness they profess.
The merit of a lucky guess —
When daily how-d'ye's come of
course,
And servants answer: "Worse and
worse!" —
Would please them better than to tell.
That, God be praised ! thedean is well.
Then he, who prophesied the best.
Approves his foresight to the rest:
' ' You know I always feared the worst.
And often told you so at first."
He'd rather choose that I should die,
Than his prediction i)rove a lie.
Not one foretells I shall recover.
But all agree to give me over.
THACKERAY
Yet, should some neighbor feel a
pain
Just in the parts where I complain,
How many a message would he send?
What hearty prayers that I should
mend !
Inquire what regimen I kept ?
What gave me ease, and hoAV I slept ?
And more lament when I was dead.
Than all the snivellers round my bed.
My good companions, never fear;
For, though you may mistake a year,
Tliough your prognostics run too fast.
They must be verified at last.
Behold the fatal day arrive !
How is the dean ? he's just alive.
Now the departing prayer is read ;
He hardly breathes. The dean is
dead.
Before the passing-bell begun,
Tlie news through half the town has
run;
"Oh! may we all for death pre-
pare!
What has he left ? and who's the
heir?"
I know no more than -what the
news is;
'Tis all bequeathed to public uses.
"To public uses! there's a wliim!
What had the public done for him ?
Mere envy, avarice, and pride :
He gave it all — Imt first lie died.
; And had the dean in all the nation
i No worthy friend, no poor rela-
j tion ?
So ready to do strangers good,
' Forgetting his own flesh and blood ! "
William Makepeace Thackeray.
THE BALLAD OF BOUILLABAISSE.
A STREET there is in Paris famous.
For wluch no rhyme our language
yields.
Rue Neuve des Petits Champs its
name is —
The New Street of the Little Fields ;
And there's an inn, not rich and
splendid.
But still in comfortable case —
The which in youth I oft attended,
To eat a bowl of Bouillabaisse.
This Bouillabaisse a noble dish is —
A sort of soup, or broth, or brew,
Or hotchpotcli of all sorts of fishes.
That Greenwich never could outdo ;
Green herbs, red peppers, muscles,
saffern.
Soles, onions, garlic, roach, and
dace;
All tliese you eat at Terre's tavern.
In that one dish of Bouillabaisse.
Indeed, a rich and savory stew 't is;
And true philosophers, methinks.
Who love all sorts of natural beauties.
Should love good victuals and good
drinks.
And Cordelier or Benedictine
Might gladly, sure, his lot embrace.
Nor find a fast-day too afflicting,
AVhich served him up a Bouilla-
baisse.
I wonder if the house still there is ?
Yes, here the lamp is as before;
The smiling, red-cheeked ecaillere is
Still opening oysters at the door.
Is Terre still alive and able ?
I recollect his droll grimace ;
He'd come and smile before your
table.
And hoped you liked your Bouilla-
baisse.
We enter; nothing's changed or older.
" How's Monsieur Terre, waiter,
pray?"
The waiter stares and slirugs his
shoulder; —
"Monsieur is dead this many a
day."
" It is the lot of saint and sinner.
So honest Terre's run his race! "
" What will Monsieur require for din-
ner ?'"
"Say, do you still cook Bouilla-
baisse ?"
"Oh, oui. Monsieur," 's the waiter's
answer;
" Quel vin Monsieur desire-t-il ? "
"Tell me a good one." "That I
can, sir;
The Chambertin with yellow seal. '
" So Terre's gone," I say, and sink in
My old accustomed corner-place;
" He's done with feasting and with
drinking,
With Burgundy and Bouillabaisse."
My old accustomed corner here is —
The table still is in the nook;
Ah ! vanished many a busy year is,
This well-known chair since last I
took.
When first I saw ye, Cava LuogM,
I'd scarce a beard upon my face.
And now a grizzled grim old fogy,
I sit and wait for Bouillabaisse. '
Where are you, old companions trusty
Of early days, here met to dine ?
Come, M'aiter! quick, a tlagon crusty,
I'll pledge them in the good old
wine.
The kind old voices and old faces
My memory can quick retrace ;
Around the board they take their
l^laces.
And share the wine and Bouilla-
baisse.
There's Jack has made a wondrous
marriage ;
There's laughing Tom is laiighing
yet;
There's brave Augustus drives his
carriage ;
There's poor old Fred in the Ga-
zette ;
On James's head the grass is growing:
Good Lord ! the world has wagged
apace
Since here we set the claret flowing.
And drank, and ate the Bouilla-
baisse.
Ah me ! how quick the days are flit-
ting !
I mind me of a time that's gone.
When here I'd sit as now I'm sitting.
In this same place — but not alone.
A fair young form was nestled near
me,
A dear, dear face looked fondly up.
And sweetly spoke and smiled to
cheer me.
— There' s no one now to share my
cup.
I drink it as the Fates ordain it.
Come, fill it, and have done with
rhymes ;
Fill up the lonely glass and drain it
In memory of dear old times.
Welcome the wine, whatever the seal
is;
And sit you down and say your
grace
With thankful heart whate'er the
meal is.
Here comes the smoking Bouilla-
baisse I
SORROWS OF WERTHER.
Weether had a love for Charlotte
Such as words could never utter;
Would you know how first he met her?
She was cutting bread and butter.
Charlotte was a married lady.
And a moral man was Werther,
And for all the wealth of Indies
Would do nothing for to hurt her.
So he sighed and pined and ogled.
And his passion boiled and bubbled.
Till he blew his silly brains out.
And no more was by it troubled.
Charlotte having seen his body
Borne before her on a shutter.
Like a well-conducted person.
Went on cutting bread and butter.
LITTLE BILLEE.
There were three sailors of Bristol
City
Who took a boat and went to sea.
But first with beef and captain's bis-
cuits.
And pickled pork they loaded she.
7S-4
THRALE.
There was gorging Jack, and guzzling
Jimmy,
And the yoimgest he was little
Billee.
Now when they'd got as far as the
Equator,
They'd nothing left but one split
pea.
Says gorging Jack to guzzling Jimmy,
"'I am extremely hungaree."
To gorging Jack says guzzling Jimmy,
"We've nothing left, us must eat
we."
.Says gorging Jack to guzzling Jimmy,
"With one another we shoi;kln't
agree !
There's little Bill, he's young and
tender.
We're old and tough, so let's eat
he."
" O Billy! we're going to kill and eat
you,
.So undo the button of your che-
mie."
When Bill received this information,
He used his pocket-handkerchie.
'• First let me say my catechism.
Which my poor mother taught to
me."
" 3Iake haste! make haste!" says
guzzling Jimmy,
While Jack pidled out his snicker-
snee.
Billee went up to the maiu-top-gallant
mast.
And down he fell on his bended
knee.
He scarce had come to the Twelfth
Commandment
When up he jumps — "There's
land I see!"
•'Jerusalem and Madagascar,
And North and South Amerikee,
There's the British flag a riding at
anchor.
With Admiral Napier, K. C. B."
So when they got aboard of the Ad-
miral's,
He hanged fat Jack and flogged
Jimmee
But as for little Bill, he made him
The captain of a Seventy-three.
Hester L. Thrale (Piozzi).
THE THREE WAliNINGS.
The tree of deepest root is found
Least willing still to quit the ground ;
'Twas therefore said by ancient sages,
That love of life increased with years
So much, that in our later stages.
When pains grow sharp and sickness
rages.
The greatest love of life appears.
This great affection to believe.
Which all confess, but few perceive,
If old assertions can't prevail,
Be pleased to hear a modern tale.
When sports went round and all
were gay.
On neighbor Dodson's wedding-day,
Death called aside the jocund groom
With him into another room.
And, looking grave, "You must,"
says he,
" Quit your sweet bride, and come
with me. "
"With you ! and quit my Susan's side?
With you!" the hapless husband
cried ;
" Young as I am, 't is monstrous
hard !
Besides, in truth, I'm not prepared:
My tlioughts on other matters go;
This is my wedding-day, you know. "
What more he urged I have not
heard,
His reasons could not well be
stronger ;
So Death the poor delinquent spared,
And left to live a little longer.
THRALE.
785
Yet calling up a serious look,
His liour-glass trembled while he
spoke —
"Neighbor," he said, "farewell! no
more [hour;
Sliall Death disturb your mirthful
And further, to avoid all blame
Of cruelty upon my name,
To give you time for preparation.
And fit you for your future station,
Three several warnings you shall
have.
Before you' re summoned to the grave ;
Willing for once I'll quit my prey,
And grant a kind reprieve,
In hopes you'll have no more to say.
But Mhen 1 call again this way.
Well pleased the world will leave."
To these conditions both consented,
And parted perfectly contented.
What next the hero of our tale befell,
How long he lived, how wise, how
well,
How roundly he pursued his course.
And smoked his pipe, and stroked
his horse,
The willing nuise shall tell :
He chaffered then, he bought and
sold.
Nor once perceived his growing old.
Nor thought of death as near :
His friends not false, his wife no
shrew,
Many his gains, his children few.
He passed his hours in jieace.
But while he viewed his Avealth
increase.
While thus along life's dusty road
The beaten track content he trod.
Old time, whose haste no mortal
spares,
Uncalled, unheeded, inuxwares.
Brought on his eightieth year.
And now, one night, in musing mood,
As all alone he sate.
The unwelcome messenger of Fate
Once more before him stood.
Half killed with anger and surprise,
"So soon returned!" old Dodson
cries.
"So soon, d'ye call it!" Death
replies ;
"Surely, my friend, you're but in
jest!
Since I was here before
'T is six-and-thirty years at least.
And you are now fourscore. ' '
"So much the worse," the clown
rejoined ;
" To spare the aged would be kind ;
However, see your search be legal ;
And yoiu' authority, — is 't regal ?
Else yoiT are come on a fool's errand,
With but a secretary's warrant.
Beside, you promisei me three
warnings.
Which I have looked for nights and
mornings ;
But for that loss of time and ease
I can recover damages. "
"I know," cries Death, " that at
the best
I seldom am a welcome guest ;
But don't be captious, friend, at
least :
I little thought you'd still be able
To stump about your farms and
stable :
Your years have run to a great
length ;
I wish you joy, though, of your
strength!"
" Hold," savs the farmer, " not so
fast!
I have been lame these four years
past!"
"And no great wonder," Death
replies :
" However, you still keep your eyes;
And sure, to see one's loves and
friends
For legs and arms would make
amends. "
"Perhaps," says Dodson, "so it
might.
But latterly I've lost my sight. "'
" This is a shocking tale, 't is true;
But still there's comfort left for you:
Each strives your sadness to amuse ;
I warrant you hear all the news."
"There's none,'' ciies he; "anil
if there were,
I'm grown so deaf, I could iu)t hear. ''
7!
TROWBRIDGE.
"Nay, then," the spectre stern
rejoined,
" These are unjustifiable yearnings:
If you are lame and deaf and blind,
You've liad your three suthcient
warnings ;
So come along, no more we'll part. "
He said, and touched him with his
dart.
And now, old Dodson, turning pale.
Yields to his fate, — so ends my
tale.
John Townsend Trowbridge.
THE VAGABONDS.
We are two travellers, Iloger and I.
Koger's my dog. — Come here, you
scamp !
Jump for the gentleman, — mind your
eye!
Over the table, — look out for the
lamp !
The rogue is growing a little old;
Five years we've tramped through
wind and weather.
And slept out-doors when nights
were cold.
And eat and drank — and starved —
together.
We've learned what comfort is, I tell
you!
A bed on the floor, a bit of rosin,
A fire to thaw our thumbs ( poor fellow !
The paw he holds up there's been
frozen).
Plenty of catgut for my fiddle
(This out-door business is bad for
strings).
Then a few nice buckwheats hot from
the griddle.
And Roger and I set up for kings !
No, thank ye, sir, — 1 never drink;
Kogerandlareexceedingly moral, —
Aren't we, Roger ?— See him wink ! —
AVell, something hot, then — we
won't quarrel.
He's thirsty, too. — see him nod his
head?
What a pity, sir, that dogs can't
talk!
He understands every word that's
said,
And he knows good milk from
water-and-chalk.
The truth is, sir, now I reflect,
I've been so sadly given to grog,
I wonder I've not lost the respect"
(Here's to you, sir!) even of my
dog.
But he sticks by, through thick and
thin ;
And this old coat,with its empty
pockets.
And rags that smell of tobacco and
gin.
He'll follow 'while he has eyes in
his sockets.
There isn't another creature living
Would do it, and prove, through
every disaster,
So fond, so faithful, and so forgiving,
To such a misera})le, thankless
master !
No, sir! — see him wag his tail and
grin !
By George ! it makes my old eyes
water !
That is, there's something in this gin
That chokes a fellow. But no
matter !
We'll have some music, if you're
willing.
And Roger (hem! what a plague a
cougli is, sir!)
Shall march a little — Start, you
villain !
Paws up ! Eyes front ! Salute your
officer !
'Bout face! Attention! Take vour
rifle !
(Some dogs have arms, you see!)
Now hold your
Cap while the gentleman gives atrifle,
To aid a poor old patriot soldier!
TROWBRIDGE.
787
Marcli ' Halt ! Now show how the
i-ebel shakes
When he stands up to hear his
sentence.
Now tell us how many drams it takes
To honor a jolly new acquaintance.
Five yelps. — that's live ; he's mighty
knowing !
The night'li before us, fill the
glasses !
Quick, sir' I'm ill, — my brain is
going! —
Some brandy, — thank you, — there !
it passes !
Why not reform ? That's easy said;
But I've gone through such
wretched treatment, [bread.
Sometimes forgetting the taste of
And scarce remembering what meat
meant,
That my poor stomach's past refonn;
And there are times when, mad
with thinking,
I'd sell out heaven for something warm
To prop a horrible inward sinking.
Is there a way to forget to think ?
At your age, sir, home, fortune,
friends,
A dear girl's love, — but I took to
drink ; — .
The same old story; you know
how it ends.
If you could have seen these classic
features, —
You needn't laugh, sir; they were
not then
Such a burning libel on God's
creatiires :
I was one of your handsome men !
If you had seen her. so fair and
young.
Whose head was happy on this
breast! |sung
If you could have heard the songs 1
When the wine went round, you
wouldn't have guessed
That ever I, sir, should be straying
From door to door with fiddle and
dog,
Eagged and penniless, and playing
To vou to-night for a glass of gros !
She' s married since, — a parson' s wife ;
'Twas better for her that we should
part, —
Better the soberest, prosiest life.
Than a blasted home and a broken
heart.
I have seen her ? Once : I was weak
and spent
On the dusty road: a carriage
stopped :
But little she dreamed, as on she
went.
Who kissed the coin that her fin-
gers ilropped !
You've set me talking, sir; I'm
sorry ; [change
It makes me wild to think of the
What do you care for a beggar's stoiy ?
Is it amusing ? you find it strange ?
I had a mother so proud of me !
'Twas well she died before — Do
you know
If the happy spirits in heaven can see
The ruin and wretchedness here
below ?
Another glass, and strong, to deaden
This pain ; then Roger and I will
start.
I wonder, has he such a lumpish,
leaden.
Aching thing in place of a heart ?
He is sad sometimes, and would
weep, if he could.
No doubt, remembering things that
were,
A virtuous kennel, with plenty of
food, |ciu\
And himself a sober, respectable
I'm better now; that glass was warm-
ing.
You rascal ! limber your lazy feet !
We nmst be fiddling and performing
For supper and bed, or starve in
the street.
Not a very gay life to lead, you think?
But soon we shall go where lodg-
ings are free,
x\.nd the sleepers need neither victuals
nor drink;
The sooner, the better for Roger
and me !
TROWBRIDGE.
DARIUS GREEN^.
If ever there lived a Yankee lad,
Wise or otherwise, good or bad.
Who, seeing the birds fly, didn't jump
With flaj^ping arms from stake or
stmup.
Or, spreading the tail
Of his coat for a sail.
Take a soaring leap from post or rail,
And wonder why
He couldn't fly.
And flap and flutter and wish and
try—
If ever you knew a country dunce
Who didn't try that as often as once,
All I can say is, that's a sign
He never would do for a hero of mine.
An aspiring genius was D. Green :
The son of a farmer, — age fourteen:
His body was long and lank and
lean, —
Just right for flying, as will be seen;
He had two eyes as bright as a bean,
And a freckled nose that grew be-
tween,
A little awry, — for I must mention
That he had riveted his attention
Upon his wonderful invention.
Twisting his tongue as he twisted the
strings
And working his face as he worked
the wings,
And with every turn of gimlet and
screw
Turning and screwing his mouth
I'ound too.
Till his nose seemed bent
To catch the scent.
Around some corner, of new-baked
pies.
And his wrinkled cheeks and his
squinting eyes
Grew puckered into a queer grimace.
That made him look very droll in the
face.
And also very wise.
And wise he must have been, to do
more
Than ever a genius did before.
Excepting Dsedalus of yore
And his son Icarus, who wore
Upon their backs
Those wings of wax
He had read of in the old almanacs.
Darius was clearly of the opinion
That the air was also man's dominion,
And that, with paddle or fin or
pinion.
We soon or late
Should navigate
The azure as now we sail the sea.
The thing looks simple enough to me ;
And if you doubt it,
Hear how Darius reasoned about it.
'•The birds can fly,
An' why can't I?
Must we give in,"
Says he with a grin,
" 'T the bluebird an' phoebe
Are smarter n we be '?
Jest fold our hands an' see the swaller
An' blackbird an' catbird beat us
holler ?
Does the leetlechatterin'. sassy wren,
No bigger' n my thumb, know more
than men ?
Jest show me that !
Er prove 't the bat
Hez got more brains than's in my bat.
An' I'll back down, an' not till
then ! "
He argued further: " Ner I can't see
What's th' use of wings to a bumble-
bee,
Fer to get a livin' with, more'n to
me ; —
Ain't my business
Importanter'n his'n is ?
" That Icarus
Was a silly cuss, —
Him an' his daddy Daedalus.
They might 'a' knowed wings made
o' wax
Wouldn't stand sun-heat an' hard
whacks.
I'll make mine o' luther,
Er suthin er other. ' '
And he said to himself, as he tin-
kered and planned :
"But I ain't goin' to show my hand
TROWBRIDGE.
789
To nummies that never can under-
stand
The fust idee that's big an' grand.
They'd 'a'laft an' made fun
O' Creation itself afore 't was done ! "
So he kept his secret from all the rest,
Safely buttoned within his vest;
And in the loft above the shed
Himself he locks, with thimble and
thread
And wax and hammer and buckles
and screws,
And all such things as geniuses use ; —
Two bats for patterns, curious fel-
lows !
A charcoal-pot and a pair of bellows ;
An old hoop-skirt or two, as well as
Some wire, and several old umbrellas ;
A carriage-cover, for tail and wings;
A piece of harness ; and straps and
strings ;
And a big strong box,
In which he locks
These and a hundred other things.
His grinning brothers, Reuben and
Burke
And Nathan and Jotham and Solo-
mon, ku-k
Around the corner to see him work, —
Sitting cross-legged, like a Turk,
Drawing the waxed-end througli with
a jerk,
And boring the holes with a comical
quirk
Of his wise old head, and a knowing
smirk.
But vainly they mounted each other's
backs.
And poked through knot-holes and
pried through cracks;
With wood from the pile and straw
from the stacks
He plugged the knot-holes and calked
the cracks;
And a bucket of water, which one
would think
He had brought up into the loft to
drink
When he chanced to be dry.
Stood always nigh.
For Darius was sly !
And whenever at work he happened
to spy
At chink or crevice a blinking eye.
He let a dipper of water fly.
" Take that! an' ef ever ye git a peep.
Guess ye' 11 ketch a weasel asleep!"
And he sings as he locks
His big strong box : —
S()N(;.
" The weasel's head is small an' trim,
An' he is leetle an' long an' slim.
An' quick of motion an' nimble of
limb.
An' ef yeou'll be
Advised by me.
Keep wide awake when ye're ketchin'
him!"
So day after day
He stitched and tinkered and ham-
mered away.
Till at last 'twas done, —
The greatest invention under the
sun !
"An' now," says Darius, "hooray
f er some f ini ! ' '
'Twas the Fourth of July,
And the weather was dry.
And not a cloud was on all the sky.
Save a few light fleeces, which here
and there.
Half mist, half air.
Like foam on the ocean went float-
ing by:
Just as lovely a morning as ever was
seen
For a nice little trip in a flying-ma-
chine.
Thought cunning Darius : "Now I
shan't go
Along 'ith the fellers to see the show.
I'll say I've got sicli a terrible cough !
An' then, when the folks 'ave all
gone off,
I'll hev full swing
Fer to try the thing.
An' practyse a leetle on the wing.''
" Ain't goin' to see the celebration? "
Says Brother Nate. "No; bothera-
tion!
I've gotsich a cold — a toothache — I —
My gracious! — feel's though I should
fly!"
Said Jotliam, " iSho ! /
Guess ye better go."
Btit Darius said, ''No!
Sliouldn't wonder 'f yeou miglit see
me, tliougli,
'Long 'bout noon, ef I git red
O' tliis jumpin", thumpin' pain 'n my
liead."
For all the while to himself he said : —
" 1 tell ye what!
I'll fly a few times around the lot,
To see how 't seems, then soon 'si've
got
The hang o' the thing, ez likely's not,
I'll astonish the nation.
An' all creation.
By flyin' over the celebration !
Over their heads I'll sail like an
eagle ;
I'll balance myself on my wings like
a sea-gull ;
I'll dance on the chimbleys; I'll stan'
on the steeple ;
I'll flop up to winders an' scare the
people !
I'll light on the llbbe'ty-pole, an'
crow ;
An' I'll say to the gawpin' fools
below,
' What world's this 'ere
That I've come so near ? '
Fer I'll make 'em b'lieve I'm a chap
f'm the moon;
An' I'll try a race 'itli their ol' bal-
loon!"
He crept from his bed ;
And, seeing the others were gone, he
said,
" I'm a-gittin' over the cold'n my
head."
And away he sped,
To open the wonderful box in the
shed.
His brothers had walked but a little
way
When Jotham to Nathan chanced to
say,
" What on airth is he up to, hey ? "
"Don'o' — the's suthin' er other to
pay,
Er he wouldn't 'a'stayed to hum to-
day."
Says Burke, '"His toothache's all'n
his eye I
He never'd miss a Fo'th-o'-July.
Ef he hedn't got some machine to
try."
Then Sol, the little one, spoke: '• By
darn !
Le's hurry back an' hide'n the barn,
An' pay hun fer tellin' us that yarn ! "
"Agreed!" Through the orchard
they creep back.
Along by the fences, behind the
stack.
And one by one, through a hole in
the wall.
In under the dusty bai-n they crawl.
Dressed in their Sunday garments
all;
And a very astonishing sight was
that,
When each in his cobwebbed coat
and hat
Came up through the floor like an
ancient rat.
And there they hid ;
And Reuben slid
The fastenings back, and the door
undid.
" Keep dark! said he,
" While I squint an' see what the' is
to see."
As knights of old put on their mail. —
From head to foot
An iron suit.
Iron jacket and iron boot.
Iron breeches, and on the head
No hat, but an iron pot instead.
And under the chin the bail, —
I believe they called the thing a helm :
And the lid they carried they called
a shield ;
And, thus accoutred, they took the
held.
Sallying forth to overwhelm
The dragons and pagans that plagued
the realm : —
So this modern knight
Prepared for flght.
Put on his winiis and strapped them
tight; ^
Jointed and jaunty, strong and
lisht:
TROWBRIDGE.
791
Buckled them fast to shoulder and
hip, —
Ten feet they measured from tip to
tip:
And a liehn had he, but that he wore
Not on his head Hke those of yore.
But more hke the helm of a ship.
'• Hush!" Reuben said,
" He's up in the shed!
He's opened the winder, — I see his
head !
He stretches it out,
An' pokes it about,
Lookin' to see if the coast is clear.
An' noboily near ; —
Guess he don'o' who's hid in here!
He's ricjsjin' a spring-board over the
^sill!
Stop laffin' Solomon ! Burke, keep
still !
He's a climin' out now. Of all the
things !
Wat's he got on? I van, it's wings!
And that 'tother thing? I vum, it's
a tail !
An' there he sets like a hawk on a
rail !
Steppin' careful, he travels the length
Of his spring-board, and teeters to
try its strength.
Now he stretches his wings, like a
monstrous bat;
Peeks over his shoulder, this way an'
that,
Fer to see "f the's any one passin' by;
But the's on'y a ca'f an' a goslin
nigh.
Tlieij turn up at him a wonderin"
eye,
To see — The dragon? he's goin' to
fly!
Away he goes! Jimminy ! what a
jiuup !
Flop — flop — an' plump
To the ground with a thump !
Flutt'rin" an' flound'rin, all'n a
lump! "
As a demon is luu'led by an angel's
spear
Heels over head, to his proper
sphere.
Heels over head, and head over heels.
Dizzily down the abyss he wheels,
So fell Darius. Upon his crown.
In the midst of the barn-yard he
came down.
In a wonderful whirl of tangled
strings.
Broken braces and broken springs.
Broken tail and broken wings.
Shooting stars, and various things.
Barn-yard litter of straw and chaff,
And much that \vasn't so sweet by
half.
Away with a bellow fied the calf.
And what was that? Did the gosling
laugh?
'Tis a merry roar
From the old barn-door,
Ai\(\ he hears the voice of Jotham
crying,
"Say, D'rius! how de yeou like
fly in' ?"
Slowly, ruefully, where he lay,
Darius just turned and looked that
way.
As he stanched his sorrowful nose
with his cuff.
" Wal, I like flyin' well enough,"
He said; "but the' ain't such a
thunderin' sight
O' fun in't when ye come to light."
I have just room for the moral here ;
And this is the moral : Stick to your
sphere.
Or if you insist, as you have the
right.
On spreading your wings for a loftier
flight.
The moral is, — Take care how you
light.
792
JOHN WO L GOT {PETER PINDAR).
John Wolcot (Peter Pindar).
THE liAZOR-SELLER.
A FELLOAV in a market town,
Most musical, cried razors up and
down,
And offered twelve for eighteen-
pence ;
Which certainly seemed wondrous
cheap,
And for the money quite a heap.
As every man would huy, with
cash and sense.
A country bumpkin the great offer
heai'd ;
Poor Hodge, who suffered by a broad
black beard.
That seemed a shoe-brush stuck
beneath his nose :
With cheerfulness the eighteen-pence
he paid,
And proudly to himself in whispers,
said,
"This rascal stole the razors, I
suppose.
" No matte;; if the fellow he a knave.
Provided that the razors shave;
It certainly will be a monstrous
prize. "
So home the clown, with his good
fortune, went.
Smiling in heart and soul, content.
And quickly soaped himself to ears
and eyes.
Being well lathered from a dish or tub,
Hodge now began with grinning pain
to grub,
.Just like a hedger cutting furze:
'Twas a vile razor! — then the rest
he tried —
All were impostors — " Ah! " Hodge
sighed ,
I wish my eighteen-pence within
my purse."
Hodge sought the fellow
him — and begun :
• found
"P'rhaps, Master Razor-rogue, to
you 'tis fmi.
That people tiay themselves out of
their lives:
You rascal ! for an hour have I been
grubbing,
Giving my crying whiskers here a
scrubbing.
With razors just like oyster-knives.
Sirrah! I tell you, you're a knave,
To ciy up razors that can't shave. "
'■ Friend," quoth the razor-man,
" I'm not a knave:
As for the razors you have bought.
Upon my soul I never thought
That they Avould shave. "
" Xot think they'd shave!" quoth
Hodge, with wondering eyes.
And voice not nuich unlike an
Indian yell ;
" What were they made for then, you
dog ? " he cries;
" Made!" quoth the fellow, with a
smile, — "to sell"
THE PILGUIMS AND THE PEAS.
A BRACE of sinners, for no good.
Were ordered to the Virgin
Mary's shrine.
Who at Loretto dwelt in wax, stone,
wood.
And in a curled white wig looked
wondrous fine.
Fifty long miles had these sad rogues
to travel.
AVith something in their shoes much
worse than gravel :
In short, their toes so gentle to
amuse.
The priest had ordered peas into
their shoes:
A nostrum famous in old popish
times
For purifying souls deep sunk in
crimes :
ANONYMOUS.
793
A sort of apostolic salt,
That popish parsons for its jDOwers
exalt,
For keeping souls of sinners sweet,
Just as our kitchen salt keeps meat.
The knaves set off on the same day.
Peas in their shoes, to go and pray ;
But very different was their speed,
I wot:
One of the sinners galloped on.
Light as a bullet from a gun ;
The other limped as if he had been
shot.
One saw the Virgin, soon — peccavi
cried —
Had his soul whitewashed all so
clever ;
"When home again he nimbly hied.
Made fit with saints above to live
for ever.
In coming back, however, let me
say.
He met his brother rogue about half-
way —
Hobbling with outstretched hands
and bending knees.
Cursing the souls and bodies of the
peas :
His eyes in tears, his cheeks and
brows in sweat,
Deep sympathizing with his groaning
feet.
"How now!" the light-toed white-
washed pilgrim broke,
" You lazy lubber! "
" You see it! " cried the other, "'tis
no joke ;
My feet once hard as any rock.
Are now as soft as blubber.
" But, brother sinner, do explain
How 'tis that you are not in pain —
AVhat power hath work'd a wonder
for //OH?- toes —
Whilst I, just like a snail, am
crawling
Now groaning, now on saints
devoutly bawling,
Whilst not a rascal comes to ease my
woes?
" How is't that you can like a grey-
hound go.
Merry as if nought had happened,
burn ye?"
"Why,'' cried the other, grinning,
' ' you must know.
That just before I ventured on my
journey.
To walk a little more at ease,
I took the liberty to boil my peas ! "
Anonymous.
THE EGGS AND THE HORSES.
A MATRIMOIflAL EPIC.
John Dobbins was so captivated
By Mary Trueman's fortune, face,
and cap,
(With near two thousand pounds
the hook was baited),
That in he popped to matrimony's
trap.
One small ingredient towards happi-
ness,
It seems ne'er occupied a single
thought ;
For his accomplished bride
Appearing well supplied
With tlie three charms of riches,
beauty, dress.
He did not, as he ought.
Think of aught else; so no in-
quiry made he
As to the temper of his lady.
And here was certainly a great omis-
sion;
None should accept of Hymen's gentle
fetter,
" For worse or better," [tion.
Whatever be their prospect or condi-
794
ANONYMOUS.
Without acquaintance with each
As it has been
other's nature;
My lot to see, I think you'll own your
For many a mild and quiet crea-
wife
ture
As good or better than the generality.
Of charming disposition,
Alas! by thoughtless marriage has
An interest in your case I really
destroyed it.
take.
So take advice; let girls dress e'er so
And therefore gladly this agreement
tastily.
make :
Don't enter into wedlock hastily
An hundred eggs within the basket
Unless you can't avoid it.
lie,
With which your luck, to-morrow,
Week followed week, and it must
you shall try;
be confest,
Also my five best horses, with my
The bridegroom and the bride had
cart ;
both been blest;
And from the farm at dawn you shall
Month after month had languidly
depart.
transpired.
All round the country go,
Both parties became tired :
And be particular, I beg;
Year after year dragged on ;
Where husbands rule, a horse be-
Their happiness was gone.
stow,
But where the wives, an egg.
Ah ! foolish pair !
And if the horses go before the
" Bear and forbear"
eggs,
Should be the rule for married folks
I'll ease you of your wife, — I will, -
to take.
I'fegs!"
But blind mankind (poor discon-
tented elves) !
Away the married man departed
Too often make
Brisk and light-hearted:
The misery of themselves.
Not doubting that, of course,
The first five houses each would take
At length the husband said, "This
a horse.
will not do !
At the first house he knocked,
Mary, I never will be ruled by you;
He felt a little shocked
So, wife, d' ye see ?
To hear a female voice, with angiy
To live together as we can't agree,
roar.
Suppose we part!"
Scream out,— " Hullo !
With woman's pride.
Who's there below ?
Mary replied.
Why, husband, are you deaf ? go to
" With all my heart!"
the door.
See who it is, 1 beg."
John Dobbins then to Mary's father
Our poor friend John
goes.
Trudged quickly on,
And gives the list of his imagined
But first laid at the door an egg.
woes.
I will not all his journey through
" Dear son-in-law ! " the father said.
The discontented traveller pursue;
" I see
Suffice it here to say
All is quite true that you've been
That when his first day's task was
telling me;
nearly done.
Yet there in marriage is such strange
He'd seen an hundred husbands,
fatality,
minus one.
That when as much of life
And eggs just ninety-nine had given
You shall have seen
away.
ANONYMOUS.
795
''Hal there's a house where he I
seek must dwell,"
At length cried John; "I'll go and
ring the bell."
The servant came, — John asked him,
"Pray,
Friend, is your master in the
way? "
"No," said tlie man, with
smiling phiz,
" My master is not, but my mis-
tress is;
Walk in that parlor, sir, my
lady's in it:
Master will be himself there — in
a minute."
The lady said her husband then was
dressing,
And, if his business was not very
pressing,
She would prefer that he should Avait
until
His toilet was completed ;
Adding, " Pray, sir, be seated."
," Madam, I will,"
Said John, with great politeness;
"but I own
That you alone
Can tell me all I wish to know;
Will you do so ?
Pardon my rudeness
And just iiave tlie goodness
(A wager to decide) to tell me —
do —
Who governs in this liouse, — your
spouse or you ? ' '
"Sir," said the lady, with a
doubting nod,
"Your question's very odd;
But as I think none ought to be
Ashamed to do their duty, do
you see ?
On that account I scruple not to
say
It always is my pleasure to obey.
But here's my husband (always
sad without me) ;
Take not my word, but ask him,
if you doubt me."
'* Sir," said the husband, " 't is most
true;
I promise you,
A more obedient, kind, and gentle
woman
Does not exist."
" Give us your fist,"
Said John, " and, as the case is some-
thing more than common.
Allow me to present you witli a
beast
Worth fifty guineas at tlie very
least.
" There's Smiler, sir, a beauty, you
must own.
There's Prince, tliat handsome
black.
Ball the gray mare, and Saladin the
roan.
Besides old Dunn ;
• Come, sir, choose one ;
But take advice from me,
Let Prince be he;
Why, sir, you'll look a hero on his
back."
" I'll take the black, and thank you
too."
" Nay, husband, that will never
do;
You, know, you've often heard
me say
How much I long to have a gray;
And this one will exactly do for
me."
"No, no," said he,
" Friend, take the four others
back.
And only leave the black."
"Nay, husband, I declare
I must have the gray mare:"
Adding (with gentle force),
"The gray mare is, I'm sure, the
better horse."'
"Well, if it must be so, — good sir.
The gray mare ire prefer;
So we accept your gift." John made
a leg :
" Allow me to present you with an egg ;
'Tis my last egg remaining.
The cause of my regaining,
I trust the fond affection of my wife.
Whom I will love the better all my
life.
mm
796
ANONYMOUS.
' ' Home to content has her kind
father brought me ;
I thank him for the lesson he has
taii2;lit me."
DOCTOR DUOLLHEAD-S CURE.
TiiKEE weeks to a day had old Doctor
Drollhead
Attended Miss Dehby Keepill ;
Three weeks to a day had she lain in
her bed
Defying his marvellous skill.
She put out her tongue for the twenty-
first time,
But it looked very much as it
should ;
Her pulse with the doctor's scarce
failed of a rhyme,
As a matter jDf course, it was good.
To-day has this gentleman happened
to see —
Very strange he's not done it
before —
That the way to recovery simply
must be
Right out of this same chamber-
door.
So he said. " Leave your bed, dear
Miss Keepill, I pray;
Keep the powders and pills, if you
miist.
But the color of health will not long
stay away
If you exercise freely, I trust."
" Why, doctor! of all things, when I
am so weak
That scarce from my bed can I
stir,
Of color and exercise thus will you
speak ?
Of what are you thinking, dear
sir?"
"That a fright is the cure, my good
lady, for you,"
He said to himself and the wall.
And to frighten her, what did the
doctor do,
But jump into bed, boots and all !
And as in jumped he, why then out
jumped she,
Like a hare, except for the pother,
And shockingly shocked, pray who
wouldn't be ?
Ran, red as a rose, to her mother.
Doctor Drollhead, meanwhile, is
happily sure,
Debby owes a long life just to
him;
And vows he's discovered a capital
cure
For the bedrid when tied by a
whim.
At any rate, long, long ago this oc-
cm-red.
And Debby is not with the dead;
But in pretty good liealth, 't may be
gently inferred.
Since she makes all the family
bread.
SUPPLEMENT.
Berkeley Aiken.
USCnOWXED KINGS.
O YE uncrowned but kingly kings!
Made royal by the brain and heart;
Of all earth's wealth the noblest
part.
Yet reckoned nothing in the mart
Where men know naught but sordid
things —
All hail to you, most kingly kings !
O ye uncrowned but kingly kings !
Whose breath and words of living
flame
Have waked slave-nations from theii'
shame,
And bid tliem rise in manhood's
name, —
Swift as the curved bow backward
springs —
To follow you, most kingly kings!
O ye uncrowned but kingly kings !
Wiiose strong right arm hath oft been
bared
Where fire of righteous battle glared,
And where all odds of wrong ye
dared ! —
To think on you the heart upsprings,
O ye uncrowned but kingly kings !
O ye uncrowned luit kingly kings!
Whose biu-ning songs like lava
poured.
Have smitten like a two-edged sword
Sent forth by Heaven's avenging
Lord
To purge the eftrth where serfdom
clings
To all but you, O kingly kings !
O ye uncrowned but kingly kings !
To whose ecstatic gaze alone
The beautiful by Heaven is shown.
And who have made it all youroAMi:
Your lavish hand around us flings
Earth's richest wreaths, O noble
kings !
O ye uncrowned but kingly kings !
The heart leaps wildly at your
thought;
And the brain fires as if it caught
Shreds of your mantle; ye have
fought
Not vainly, if your glory brings
A lingering light to earth, O kings!
O ye uncrowned but kingly kings !
Whose souls on Marah's fruit did sup,
And went in fiery chariots up
When each had drained his hemlock
cup, —
Ye priests of God, but tyrants' stings,
Uncrowned but still the kingliest
Icings !
Annie R. Annan.
RECOMPENSE.
The summer coaxed me to be glad.
Entreating with tlie primrose hue
Of sunset skies, Avith downward calls
From viewless larks, with winds
that blew
The red-tipped clover's breast abroad.
And told the mirth of waterfalls;
In vain! my heart would not be
wooed
From the December of its mood.
r98
AYTON—BARR.
But on a day of wintry skies
A withei-ed rose slipped from my
book;
And as I cauglit its faint perfi;me
The soul of summer straight forsook
The little tenement it loved.
And tilled the world with song
and bloom,
Missed, in their season, by my sense,
fcjo found my heart its recompense.
Sir Robert Ayton.
FAIR AND UXWORTHY.
I DO confess thou'rt smooth and fair,
And I might have gone near to love
thee.
Had I not found the lightest prayer
That lips could speak, had power
to move thee :
But I can let thee now alone,
As Morlhy to be loved by none.
I do confess thou'rt sweet; yet find
Thee such an unthriftof thysweets,
Thy favors are but like the wind,
That kisses everything it meets;
And since thou canst with more than
one,
Thou'rt worthy to be kissed by none.
The morning rose that imtouched
stands
Armed with her briers, how sweetly
smells!
But plucked and strained through
ruder hands,
Xo more her sweetness with her
dwells.
But scent and beauty both are gone,
And leaves fall from her one by one.
►Such fate, erelong, will thee betide.
When thou hast handled been
awhile. —
Like sere flowers to be thrown aside ;
And I will sigh, while some will
smile.
To see thy love for more than one
Hath brought thee to be loved by
none.
Anna Letitia Barbauld.
THE SABBATH or THE .SOUL.
Sleep, sleep to-day, tormenting
cares.
Of earth and folly bom ;
Ye shall not dim the light that
streams
From this celestial morn.
To-morrow will be time enough
To feel your harsh control;
Ye shall not violate, this day,
The Sabbath of my soul.
Sleep, sleep forever, guilty thoughts,
Let fires of vengeance die ;
And, purged from sin, may I be-
hold
A (iod of purity.
Mary A, Barr.
frHfTE POPPIES.
O MYSTIC, mighty flower whose frail
white leaves
Silky and crumpled like a banner
furled.
Shadow the black mysterious seed
that gives
The drop that soothes and lulls a
restless world;
Nepenthes for our woe, yet swift to
kill.
Holding the knowledge of both good
and ill.
The rose for beauty may outshine
thee far,
The lily hold herself like some
sweet saint
Apart from earthly griefs, as is a
star
Apart from any fear of earthly
taint;
The snowy poppy like an angel
stands.
With consolation in her open hands.
BENJAMIN.
799
Ere History was born, the poet
sung
How godlike Thone kne^v thy com-
pelling power,
And ancient Ceres, by strange sor-
rows wrung,
Sought sweet oblivion from thy
healing Hower.
Giver of sleep! Lord of the Land of
Dreams !
C) simple weed, thou art not what
man deems.
The clear-eyed Greeks saw oft their
god of sleep
Wandering about tlirough the
blac-k midnight hours,
toothing the restless couch with
slumbers deep,
And scattering thy medicated flow-
ers.
Till hands were folded for their final
rest.
Clasping white poppies o'er a ijulse-
less breast.
We have a clearer vision; every
hour
Kind hearts and hands the poppy
juices mete.
And panting sufferers bless its kindly
power.
And \\eary ones invoke its peace-
ful sleep.
Health has its rose, and grape and
joyfid palm.
The poppy to the sick is wine and
balm.
I sing the poppy I The frail snowy
weed !
The flower of mercy! that within
its heart
Doth keep "a drop serene"' for
human need,
A drowsy balm for every bitter
smart.
For hapjiy hours the rose will idly
blow —
The poiijiy hath a charm for pain
and woe.
Park Benjamin.
PRESS ON.
Press on! there's no such word as
fail!
Press nobly on ! the goal is near, —
Ascend the mountain ! breast the
gale !
Look upward, onward, — never
fear !
Why shoidilst thou faint '? Heaven
smiles above.
Though storm and vapor intervene ;
That sun shines on, whose name is
Love,
Serenely o'er Life's shadow' d scene.
Press on ! surmount the rocky steeps,
Climb boldly o'er the torrent's
arch ;
He fails alone who feebly creeps;
He wins, who dares tlie hero's
march.
Be thou a hero ! let thy might
Tramp on eternal snows its way.
And through the ebon walls of night
Hew down a passage unto day.
Press on ! if Fortune play thee false
To-day, to-morrow she'll be true;
Whom now she sinks slie now
exalts,
Taking old gifts and granting new.
The wisdom of the present hour
Makes up for follies past and
gone, —
To weakness strength succeeds, and
power
From frailty springs, — press on!
jsress on !
Press on! what though upon the
ground
Thy love has been poured out like
rain ?
That happiness is always found
The sweetest, which is born of
pain.
Oft 'mid the forest's deepest glooms,
A bird sings from some blighted
tree.
And, in the dreariest desert, blooms
A never-dving rose for thee.
800
BEN8EL —BLACKIE.
Therefore, press on! and reach the
goal,
And gahi the prize and wear the
crown ;
Faint not ! for to the steadfast soul
Come wealth and honor and re-
nown.
To thine own self be true, and keep
Thy mind from sloth, thy heart
from soil ;
Tress on ! and thou shalt surely reap
A heavenly harvest for thy toil !
Annie Berry Bensel
THE LADY OF THE CASTLE.
See you yonder castle stately ?
On the rocks it stands alone.
Gleaming in the silver moonlight
Like a sentinel of stone.
Years ago in that old castle
Dwelt a lady, proud and grand ;
Fairer than the fairest lady
You might find in all the land.
It A\as on her bridal morning —
So the gossips tell the tale —
Lady Hilda walked the garden,
Fairer than the roses pale.
Soon she reached the massive gate-
way,
And her dark eyes sparkled bright,
As she saw a gay procession
Wending towards the castle heiglit.
For she knew it was lier lover,
With his merry comrades all;
Foremost in the glittering pageant
Kode Count Rupert, fair and tall.
Just between them and the castle
Lay a chasm wide and deep;
They must ride still further onward
O'er the bridge their road to keep.
But Count Rupert saw the lady
Standing by the gateway there,
Dauntlessly he turned his charger.
Heeding not the cry, " Bewarel"
" It is but a narrow chasm,
Go you by the bridge," cried lie,
" I will leap to yonder hillock.
There my lady waits for me."
All in vain his comrades' warning,
Vain, alas, his page's cries;
Forward leaps the noble charger,
Lady Hilda veils her eyes.
One long cry of bitter anguish !
She who heard it, swooning, fell;
Knowing by that single outcry
All the tale there was to tell.
Turn your eyes beyond the castle.
You will see a convent drear;
There the lady lived they tell me,
Just for one brief mournful year.
There within the lofty chapel
Is a quaint and carven tomb.
Lady Hilda — well beloved —
Sleeps beneath the ghostly gloom.
Xo one dwells in that old castle.
Desolate it stands alone,
Gleaming in the silver moonlight
Like a sentinel of stone.
John Stuart Blackie.
THE HOPE OF THE HETERODOX.
In Thee, O blessed God, I hope.
In Thee, in Thee, in Thee !
Though banned by presbyter and
pope.
My trust is still in Thee.
Thou wilt not cast Thy servant
out
■ Because he chanced to see
With his own eyes, and dared to
doubt
What praters preach of Thee.
Oh no ! no ! no !
For ever and ever and aye,
(Though pope and presbyter
bray)
Thou wilt not cast away
An honest soul from thee.
BLANCUARD.
801
I look around on earth and sky,
And Thee and ever Thee,
With open heart and open eyes
How can I fail to see ?
My ear drinks in from field and fell
Life's rival floods of glee:
Where finds the i^riest his private hell
AVhen all is full of Thee ?
Oh no ! no ! no !
Though flocks of geese
Give Heaven's high ear no peace :
I still enjoy a lease
Of happy thoughts from Thee.
My faith is strong; out of itself
It grows erect and free ;
No Talmud on the Rabbi's shelf
(Mves amulets to me.
Small Greek I know, nor Hebrew
much.
But this I plainly see :
Two legs without the bishop's crutch
God gave to thee and me.
Oh no ! no ! no !
The church may loose and bind.
But mind, immortal mind,
As free as wave or wind.
Came forth, O God, from Thee !
O pious quack! thy pills are good;
But mine as good may be, "
And healthy men on healthy food
Live without you or me.
Good lady ! let the doer do !
Thought is a busy bee.
Nor honey less what it doth brew.
Though very gall to thee.
Oh no! no! no!
Though councils decree and de-
clare ;
Like a tree in the open air.
The soul its foliage fair
Spreads forth, 6 God, to Thee!
Laman Blanchard.
WISHES OF YOUTH.
Gayly and greenly let my seasons
run :
And should the war-winds of the
world uproot
The sanctities of life, and its sweet
fruit
Cast forth as fuel for the fiery
sun, —
The dews be turned to ice, — fair
days begun
In peace, wear out in pain, and
soimds that suit
Despair and discord, keep Hope's
harp-string mute.
Still let me live as Love and Life were
one :
Still let me turn on earth a childlike
gaze.
And trust the whispered charities
that bring
Tidings of human truth ; with inward
praise
Watch the weak motion of each com-
mon thing.
And find it glorious — still let me
raise
On wintry wrecks, an altar to the
Spring.
HIDDEN JOYS.
Pleasures lie thickest where no
pleasures seem :
There's not a leaf that falls upon the
ground
But holds some joy, of silence or of
sound,
Some sprite begotten of a sunnner
dream.
The very meanest things are made
supreme
With innate ecstasy. Xo grain of
sand
But moves a bright and million-
peopled land,
And hath its Edens and its Eves, I
deem.
For Love, though blind himself, a
curious eye
Ilath lent me, to behold the hearts of
things.
And touched mine ear with power.
Thus far or nigh.
Minute or mighty, fixed, or free with
wings,
802
BLUNT.
Delight from many a nameless covert
sly
Peeps sparkling, and in tones familiar
sings.
THE ELOQUENT PASTOR DEAD.
He taught the cheerfulness that still
is ours
The sweetness that still lurks in
human powers ;
if heaven be full of stars, the earth
has flowers.
His was the searching thought, the
glowing mind ;
The gentle will, to others soon re-
signed ;
But, more than all, the feeling just
and kind.
His pleasures were as melodies from
reeds —
8weet books, deep nuisic and un-
selfish deeds.
Finding immortal flowers in human
weeds.
Trae to his kind, nor of himself
afraid.
He deemed that love of God was best
ari'ayed
In love of all the things that God has
made.
He deemed man's life no feverish
dream of care,
But a high pathway into freer air.
Lift up with golden hopes and duties
fair.
He showed how wisdom turns its
houi"s to years,
Feeding the heart on joys instead of
fears,
And M'orships God in smiles, and not
in tears.
His thoughts were as a pyramid up-
piled.
On whose far top an angel stood and
smiled —
Yet in his heart was he a simple
child.
Wilfred Blunt
(PliOTEUS).
TO OKE WHO WOULD MAKE A
CONFESSION.
Oh! leave the past to bury its own
dead;
The past is naught to us, the present
all.
What need of last year's leaves to
strew love's bed ?
What need of ghosts to grace a fes-
tival ?
I would not, if I could, those days
recall.
Those days not ours. For us the
feast is spread.
The lamps are lit, and music plays
withal.
Then let us love and leave the rest
unsaid.
This island is our home. Around it
roar
Great gulfs and oceans, channels,
straits, and seas.
What matter in what wreck we
reached the shoi-e.
So we both reached it? AYe can
mock at these.
Oh! leave the past, if past indeed
there be.
I would not know it. I would know
l)ut thee.
THE TWO HIGHWAYMEN.
I LONG have had a quarrel set with
Time,
Because he robbed me. Every day
of life
Was wrested from me after bitter
strife,
I never yet could see the sun go
down
But J was angry in my heart, nor
hear
The leaves fall in the wind without a
tear
Over the dying summer. I have
known
No truce with Time nor Time's ac-
complice. Death.
BLUNT.
803
The fair world Is the witness of a
crime
Repeated every hour. For life and
breath
Are sweet to all who live; and bit-
terly
The voices of these robbers of the
heath
Sound in each ear and chill the passer-
by.
— What have we done to thee, thou
monstrous Time ?
What have we done to Death that we
must die ?
A DAY IN SUSSEX.
The dove did lend me wings. I fled
away
From the loud world which long had
troubled me.
Oh, lightly did I flee when hoyden
May
Threw her white mantle on the haw-
thorn tree.
I left the dusty highroad, and my way
Was through deejj meadows, shut
with copses fair.
A choir of thrushes poured its romid-
elay
From every hedge and every thicket
tliere.
Mild, moon-faced kine looked on,
where in the grass.
All heaped with flowers I lay, from
noon till eve;
And hares unwitting close to me did
pass.
And still the birds sang, and I could
not grieve.
Oh, what a blessed thing that evening
was!
Peace, nmsic, twilight, all that could
deceive
A soul to joy, or lull a heart to peace.
It glimmers yet across Avhole years
like these.
LAUGHTER AS D DEATH.
There is no laughter in the natural
world
Of beast or fish or bird, though no
sad doubt
Of their futurity to them unfurled
Has dared to check the mirth-com-
l)elling shout.
The lion roars his solemn thunder
out
To the sleeping Avoods. The eagle
screams her cry ;
Even the lark must strain a serious
throat
To hurl his blest defiance at the sky.
Fear, anger, jealousy have found a
voice ;
Love's pains or raptures the brute
bosom swell.
Nature has symbols for her nobler
Joys,
Her nobler sorrows. Who had dared
foretell
That only man. by some sad mock-
Should learn to laugh A\ho learns
that he must die ?
COLD COMFORT.
There is no comfort underneath the
sun.
Youth tiu-ns to age ; riches are quickly
spent ;
Pride breeds us pain, our pleasures
punishment;
The very courage which we count
upon
A single night of fever shall break
down ;
And love is slain by fear. Death last
of all
Spreads out his nets and watches for
our fall.
There is no comfort underneath the
sun!
— When thou art old, Oman, if thou
wert proud
Be humble; pride will here avail thee
not.
There is no courage which can con-
quer death.
Forget that thou wert wise. Nay,
keep thy breath
For prayer, that so thy wisdom be
forgot
And thou perhaps get pity of thy
God.
804
BOKER.
George Henry Boker.
\_From " The Book of the Dead." ]
NEARNESS.
Through the dark path, o'er which
I tread,
One voice is ever at my ear,
One muffled form deserts the dead,
And haunts my presence far and
near.
In times of douht, he wliispers trust ;
In danger, drops a ^^•arning word;
And when I waver from the just.
His low, complaining sigh is heard.
He follows me, with patient tread.
From daybreak unto evening's
close;
He bends beside me, head by head,
To scent the violet or the rose.
And sharing thus my smallest deed.
When all tlie works of day are past.
And sleep becomes a blessed need,
He lies against my heart at last.
Dear ghost, I feel no dread of thee;
A gracious conu-ade thou art grown ;
Be near me, cheer, bend over me.
When the long sleep is settling
down !
IN AUTUMN.
In hazy gold the hill-side sleeps.
The distance fades within the mist,
A cloud of lucid vapor creeps
Along the lake's pale amethyst.
The sun is but a blur of light,
The sky in ashy gray is lost ;
But all the forest-trees are bright.
Brushed by the pinions of the frost.
I hear the clamor of the crow,
The wild-ducks' far discordant cry.
As swiftly out of sight they go.
In wedges driving through the sky.
I know the sunshine of this hour,
AVarm as the glow of early May,
Will never wake the dying flower,
Xor breathe a spirit through decay.
The scarlet leaves are doomed to
fall.
The lake shall stiffen at a breath ;
The crow shall ring his dreary call
Above December's waste of death.
And so, thou bird of southern flight,
My soul is yearning for thy wings ;
I dread the thoughts that come to
light.
In gazing on the death of things.
Fain would I spread an airy plume.
For lands where endless summers
, reign.
And lose myself in tropic bloom.
And never think of death again.
MY ANSWEIi.
When I am turned to mouldering
dust,
And all my ways are lost in night,
When through me crocuses have
thrust
Their pointed blades, to find the
light;
And caught by plant and grass and
grain,
My elements are made a part
Of nature, and, through sun and
rain.
Swings in a flower my wayward
heart ;
Some curious mind may haply ask,
" Who penned this scrap of olden
song ?
Paint US the man whose Avoful task
Frowns in the i^ublic eye so long."
I answer, tndy as I can ;
I hewed the wood, the water drew;
I toiled along, a common man, —
A man, in all things, like to you.
BOL TON— BRADDOCK.
805
Sarah K. Bolton.
ENTEIiED INTO REST.
Soldier, statesman, scholar, friend,
Brother to the lowliest one.
Life has come to sudden end,
But its work is grandly done.
Toil and cares of state are o'er;
I'ain and struggle come no more.
Rest thee by Lalce Erie.
Nations weep about thy bier,
Flowers are .sent by queenly hands;
Bring the poor tlieir homage here.
Come the great from many lands.
Be thy grave our Mecca, hence,
AVith its speechless eloquence;
Best thee by Lake Erie.
Winter snows will wrap thy mound,
.Spring will sejul its wealth of bloom,
Sunnner kiss the velvet ground,
Autumn leaves lie on thy tomb:
Iloine beside this inland sea.
Where thou lov'dst in life to be:
Best thee by Lalce Erie.
Strong for riglit, in danger brave.
Tender as witli woman's heart,
Champion of the fettered slave,
Of the people's life a part.
To be loved is higliest fame;
Garfield, an immortal name !
Rest thee by Lake Erie.
All tliy gifted words shall be
Treasured speech from age to age ;
Thy heroic loyalty
Be a counti-y's heritage;
Mentor and tJiy precious ties
Sacred in the nation's eyes.
Rest thee by Lake Erie.
From thy life and deatli shall come
An ennobli'd, purer race,
Honoring labor, Avife. and liome;
More of cheer and Christian grace.
Kindest, truest ! till that day
When He rolls the stone away.
Rest thee by Lake Erie.
A. B. Boyle.
WIDOWED.
She did not sigh for death, nor make
sad moan.
Turning from smiles as one who
solace fears,
But filled with kindly deeds the wait-
ing years ;
Yet, in her heart of hearts, she lived
alone.
And in her voice there thrilled an
undertone
That seemed to rise from soundless
depths of tears;
As, when the sea is calm, one some-
times hears
The long, low murmur of a storm,
vmknown
Within the sheltered haven where he
stands.
While tokens of a tempest overpast
The changing tide brings to the
shining sands;
So on the surface of her life was cast.
An ever-present shadow of the day.
When love and joy went hand in
hand away.
Emily a. Braddock.
^A' UNTHRIET.
Browx bird, with a wisp in your
mouth for your nest,
Away! away! you have found your
guest.
Golden-ringed bee, tlirough the air-
sea steer home.
The freight of sweets that lured you
to roam.
O reapers! well may you sing, to
hold
Your arms brimful of the grain's
bossed gold.
But what to me'that ye all go by ?
An untlirift, empty-handed, fare I,
Yet I heard, as I passed, the noise
of a rill;
In my lieart of hearts, it is singing
still,
806
BRINE.
Blent with the wind's sough, the trill
of a bird,
A child's laugh and a gracious word,
Pictures I saw limned everywhere,
A light here and a shadow there —
A cloud, a stream, a flower small;
In my heart of hearts I have hid
them all ;
And some one, it may be, yet through
me
The songs shall hear and the pictures
see.
O brown bird, and bee, and reapers,
go by!
Richer than any of you am I.
Mary D. Brine.
SOMEBODY'S MOTHER.
The woman was old and ragged and
gray.
And bent with the chill of the win-
ter's day:
The street was wet with a recent
snow.
And the woman's feet were aged and
slow.
She stood at the crossing and waited
long,
Alone, uncared-for, amid the throng
Of human beings who passed her
by,
Nor heeded the glance of her anxious
eye.
Down the street with laughter and
shout,
Glad in the freedom of " school let
out,"
Came tlie boys like a flock of sheep,
Hailing the snow piled white and
deep.
Past the woman so old and gray
Hastened the children on their way.
Nor offered a helping hand to her,
So meek, so timid, afraid to stir,
Lest the carriage wheels or the horses'
feet
Should crowd her down in the slip-
pery street.
At last came one of the merry troop —
The gayest laddie of all the group :
He paused beside her and whispered
low.
"I'll help you across if you wish to
go."
Her aged hand on his strong young
arm
She ijlaced, and so, without hurt or
harm.
He guided her trembling feet along,
Proud that his own were Arm and
strong.
Then back again to his friends he
went,
His young heart happy and well con-
tent.
" She's somebody's mother, boys,
you know.
For all she's aged and poor and slow ;
And I hope some fellow will lend a
hand
To help my mother, you understand.
If ever she's poor and old and gray.
When her own dear boy is far
away."
And "somebody's mother" bowed
low her head
In her home that night, and the
prayer she said
Was, "God be kind to the noble
boy
Who is somebody's son and pride and
joy."
B r CHAN A X — B UNNEB.
807
Robert Buchanan.
n v/xn.
" O BAIRN, when I am dead,
How shall ye keep f rae harm ?
What hand will gie ye breatl ?
What lire will keep ye Mann ?
How shall ye dwell on earth awa' fra
me !"
" O mither, dinna dee! "'
" O bairn, by night or day
I hear nae sounds ava%
But voices of winds that blaw,
And the voices of ghaists that say,
Come awa' ! come awa' !
The Lord that made the wind and
made the sea.
Is hard on my bairn and me.
And I melt in his breath like snaw."
" O mither, dinna dee! "
" O bairn, it is bvit closing up the een,
And lying down never to rise again.
Many a strong man's sleeping hae I
seen, —
There is nae pain !
I'm weary, weary, and I scarce ken
why;
My summer has gone by.
And sweet were sleep, but for the
sake o' thee."
" O mither, dinna dee!"
[From Faces on the IVall.]
TO TlilFLERS.
Go, triflers with God's secret. Far,
oh. far
Be your thin monotone, your brows
flower-crowned,
Your backward-looking faces; for ye
mar
The pregnant time with silly sooth
of sound.
With flowers around the feverish
temples bound.
And withering in the close air of the
feast.
Take all the summer pleasures ye
have found.
While Circe-charmed ye turn to bird
and beast.
Meantime 1 sit apart, a lonely wight
On this bare rock amid this litful
sea.
And in the wind and rain I try to
light
A little lamp that may a beacon be.
Whereby poor ship-folk, driving
through the night,
May gain the ocean-course, and think
of me !
H. C. BUNNER.
LOXGFELLOW.
Poet, whose sunny span of fruitful
years
Outreaches earth, whose voice
within our ears
Grows silent — shall we mourn for
thee ? Our sigh
Is April's breath, our grief is April's
tears.
If this be dying, fair it is to die:
Even as a garment weariness lavs
by,
Thou layest down life, to pass as time
hath passed.
From wintry rigors to a springtime
sky.
Are there tears left to give thee at
the last,
Poet of spirits crushed and hearts
downcast.
Loved of worn women who when
work is done
Weep o'er thy jxige in twilights
fading fast ?
Oh, tender-toned and tender-
hearted one.
We give thee to the season new
begun !
Lay thy white head within the arms
of spring —
Thy song hadall her shower and
all her sun.
Nay, let us not such sorrowful
tribute bring
Now that thy lark-like soul hatli
taken -wing:
A grateful memory fills and more
endears
The silence when a bird hath
ceased to sing.
TO A DEAD WOMAN.
Not a kiss in life; but one kiss, at
life's end,
I have set on the face of Death in
trust for thee.
Through long years, keep it fresh on
thy lips, O friend!
At the gate of silence, give it back
to me.
in WIS RUSSELL.
Died in Xew Orleans, Dec, ISTS).
Small was thy share of all this
world's delight,
And scant thy poet's crown of flow-
ers of praise ;
Yet ever catches quaint of quaint
old days
Thou sang'st, and, singing, kept thy
spirit bright :
Even as to lips, the winds of winter
bite,
Some outcast Avanderer sets his flute
and plays
Till at his feet blossom the icy
ways.
And from the snowdrift's bitter
wasting white
He hears the uprising carol of the
lark,
Soaring from clover seas with
summer ripe —
While freeze upon his cheek
glad, foolish tears.
Ah ! let us hope that somewhere in
thy dark,
Herrick's full note, and Suck-
ling's pleasant pipe
Are sounding still their solace
in thine ears.
A WOMAS'S WAY.
She might have known it in the
earlier spring.
That all my heart with vague desire
was stirred ;
And, ere the summer winds had taken
wing.
I told her; but she smiled and said
no word.
The autumn's eager hand his red gold
grasped.
And she was silent; till from skies
grown drear
Fell soft one fine, first snoAv-flake, antl
she clasped
My neck, and cried, "Love, we
have lost a year!"
Thomas Burbidge.
AT DIVINE DISPOSAL.
Oil, leave thyself to God! and if,
indeed,
'Tis given thee to perform so vast a
task.
Think not at all — think not, but
kneel and ask.
O friend, by thought was never crea-
ture freed
From any sin, from any mortal
need :
Be patient ! not by thought canst thou
devise
What course of life for thee is right
and wise;
It will be written up, and thou wilt
read.
Oft like a sudden pencil of rich
light,
Piercing the thickest umbrage of the
wood.
Will shoot, amid our troubles infinite,
The spirit's voice; oft, like the balmy
flood
Of mom, sm-prise the universal night
With glory, and make all things
sweet and good.
EVENTIDE.
Comes something down with even-
tide
Beside tlie sunset's golden bars,
Beside tlie floating scents, beside
The twinkling shadows of the stars.
Upon the river's rippling face.
Flash after flash the w liite
Broke up in man}' a shallow place ;
The rest was soft and bright.
By chance my eye fell on the stream;
How many a marvellous power.
Sleeps in us, — sleeps, and doth not
dream!
This knew 1 in that hour.
For then my heart, so full of strife,
No more was in me stirred ;
My life was in the river's life.
And I nor saw nor heard.
I and the river, we were one :
The shade beneath the bank,
I felt it cool; the setting sun
Into my spirit sank.
A rushing thing in power serene
I was ; the mystery
I felt of having ever been
And being still to be.
Was it a moment or an hour ?
I knew not ; but I mourned
When from that realm of awful power,
I to these fields returned.
William Henry Burleigh.
THE HA I! VES T- CA LL.
Abide not in the land of dreams,
O man, however fair it setMus,
Where dro\vsy airs thy powers repress
In languors of sweet idleness.
Nor linger in the misty past.
Entranced in visions vague and vast ;
But with clear eye the present scan,
And hear the call of God to man.
That call, though many-voiced, is
one.
With mighty meanings in each tone;
Through sob and laughter, shriek and
prayer,
Its summons meets thee everywhere.
Think not in sleep to fold thy hands,
Forgetful of thy Lord's commands;
From duty's claims no life is free,
Behold, to-day hath need of thee.
Look up ! the wide extended plain
Is billowy with its ripened grain;
And in the siunmer winds, are rolled
Its waves of emerald and gold.
Thrust in thy sickle, nor delay
The work that calls for thee to-day;
To-morrow, if it come, will bear
Its own demands of toil and care.
The present hour allots thy task !
For ijresent strength and patience
ask.
And trust His love whose sure sup-
plies
Meet all thy needs as they arise.
Lo! the broad fields with harvest
white.
Thy hands to sti-enuous toil invite:
And he who labors and believes,
i Shall reap reward of ample sheaves.
Up! for the time is short; and soon
The morning sun will climb to noon.
Up! ere the herds, with trampling
feet
Outrunning thine, shaH spoil the
wheat.
Willie the day ling«-s. do thy best!
Full soon the night will bring its rest ;
And, duty done7 that rest shall be
Full of beatitudes to thee.
BAIX.
DASnixG in big drops on the narrow
pane,
king r
mind.
pane,
A.nd makinsf mournful music for the
810
CHATTERTON— CHAUCEM.
While plays his interlude the wizard
wind,
I hear tlie ringing of the frequent
rain :
How doth its dreamy tone the spirit
kill,
liringing a sweet forgetfulness of
pain,
Willie busy thought calls up the past
again.
And lingers mid the pure and beau-
tiful
Visions of early childhood! Sunny
faces
Meet us with looks of love, and in
the moans
Of the faint wind we hear familiar
tones,
And tread again in old familiar
places!
Such is thy power, O rain ! the heart
to bless,
Wiling the soul away from its own
wretchedness.
Thomas Chatterton.
OiV RESIGXA TION.
() God, whose thunder shakes the
sky,
Whose eye this atom globe surveys,
To Thee, my only rock, I fly.
Thy mercy in Thy justice praise.
The mystic mazes of Thy will.
The shadows of celestial light,
Are past the powers of human skill.
But what the Eternal acts, is right.
Oh. teach me in the trying hour,
W'lien anguish swells the dewy
tear,
'I'o still my sorrows, own thy power.
Thy goodness love, thy justice fear.
If in this bosom aught but Thee,
Encroaching, sought a boundless
sway,
Omniscience could the danger see.
And mercy look the cause away.
Then why, my soul, dost thou com-
plain ?
AVhy drooping, seek the dark re-
cess '?
Shake off the melancholy chain,
For God created all to bless.
But, ah ! my breast is hiunan still ;
The rising sigh, the falling teai-.
My languid vitals, feeble will.
The sickness of my soul declare.
But yet. with fortitude resigned.
ril thank the infliction of the blow.
Forbid my sigh, compose my mind.
Nor let the gush of misery flow.
The gloomy mantle of the night
Which on my sinking spirit steals
Will vanish at the morning light.
Which God, my East, my bun, re-
veals.
Geoffrey Chaucer.
THE PARSON.
A GOOD man there was of religion,
That was a poore panton of a town.
But rich he was of holy thought and
work ;
He was also a learned man, a clerk.
That Christes gospel truly woulde
preach ;
His parishens devoutly would he
teach ;
Benign he was, and wonder diligent.
And in adversity full patient;
And such he was yproved ofte
sitlies;
Full loth were him to cursen for his
tithes ;
But rather would he given out of
doubt
Unto his poor parishens about
Of his off' ring, and eke of his sub-
stance ;
He could in little thing have suflS-
sance :
Wide was his parish, and houses far
asunder.
CHAUCER.
811
But he ne left nought for no rain nor
thunder,
In sickness and in mischief, to visit
Tlie fartliest in liis parish nnicli and
lite.
Upon his feet, and in his hand a
staff:
This nohle 'nsample to his sheep he
gaf.
That first he wrought, and after-
ward he taught.
Out of the gospel he the wordes
caught.
And this figure lie added eke thereto,
That, if gold ruste, what should iron
do ?
For, if a priest he foul on whom we
trust.
No wonder is a lewed man to rust ;
For shame it is, that if a priest take
keep
To see a "fouled" shepherd and
clean sheep:
Well ought a priest ensample for to
give
By his cleanness how his sheep should
live.
He sette not his benefice to hire,
And let his sheep accumbred in the
mire.
And ran unto London imto Saint
Ponle's
To seeken him a chantery for souls.
Or with a brotherhood to bewitliold;
But dwelt at home and kepte well his
fold.
So that the wolf ne made it not mis-
carry ;
lie was a shepherd and no mer-
cenary ;
As though he holy were and virtuous.
He was to sinful men not dispitous,
Ne of his speeche dangei-ous ne
digue;
But in his teaching discreet and
benign.
To drawen folk to heaven with faire-
ness.
By good ensample, was his business;
But it were any person obstinate.
What so he were of high or low
estate.
Him would he snibben sharply for
the nones:
A better priest I trow that no where
none is.
He waited after no pomp or rever-
ence,
Ne maked him no spiced conscience ;
But Christes lore, and his apostles
twelve
He taught, but first he followed it
himselve.
GOOD COUXSEL.
Fly fro the press, and dwell with
soothfastnesse.
SuflSce unto thy good though it be
small.
For hoard hath hate, and climbing
fickleness.
Press hath envy, and weal is blent
over all.
Savour no raoi'e than thee behove
shall.
Eede well thyself that other folke
canst rede ;
And truth thee shall deliver, it is no
drede.
Paine thee not each crooked to re-
dress
In trust of her that turneth as a
ban-
Great rest standeth in little busi-
nesse,
Beware also to spurne against an
awl,
Strive not as doth a crocke with a
wall;
Deeme thyself that demest others'
deed ;
And truth thee shall deliver, it is no
drede.
That thee is sent receive in buxom-
nesse ;
The wrastling of this world askelh a
fall.
Here is no home, here is but a wilder-
nesse.
Forth, pilgrim! forth, beast, out of
thy stall !
Locke up on high, and thanke God
of all!
812
CHENEY— COOK.
Waive tliy lusts, and let thy ghost
tiiee lead ;
And truth thee shall delivei', it is no
drede.
TO HIS EMPTY rURSE.
To you, my purse, and to none other
Avight
Complaine I, for ye be my lady dere,
I am sorry now that ye be light,
For, certes, ye now make me heavy
chere.
Me were as lefe laid upon a here,
For which unto your mercy thus I
crie,
Be heavy againe, or els mote I die.
Now vouchsafe this day or it be
night.
That I of you the blissful sowne may
here,
Or see your color like the sunne
bright.
That of yelowness had never pere,
Ye be my life, ye be my hertes stere,
Queene of comfort and good com-
panie,
Be heavy againe, or els mote I die.
Now purse, that art to me my lives
light,
And saviour, as downe in this world
here.
Out of this towne helpe me by youi-
might,
Sitli that you woll not be my treasure,
For I am shave as nere as any frere,
But I pray unto your courtesie.
Be heavy againe, or els mote I die.
John Vance Cheney.
MA Y.
When beeches brighten early May,
And young grass shines along her
Avay ; •
When April willows meet the bi'eeze
Like softest dawn among the trees:
When smell of spring fills all the air.
And meadows bloom, and blue-birds
pair;
When love first laves her sunny head
Over the brook and lily-bed;
Nothing of somid or sight to grieve
From cheering morn to quiet eve,
My heart will not. for all its ease,
Forget the days to follow these.
This loveliness shall be betrayed.
This happiest of music played
From field to field, by stream and
bough.
Shall silent be, as tuneful now;
The silver launch of thistles sail
Adown the solitary vale ;
The blue solicitude of sky
Bent over beauty doomed to die.
With nightly mist shall witness here
The yielded glory of the year.
Clarence Cook.
ON ONE WHO DIED IX MA Y.
(J. H. E., May 3, 1870).
Why, Death, what dost thou here.
This time o'year ?
Peach-blow and apple-blossom ;
Clouds, white as my love's bosom;
Warm wind o' the west
Cradling the robin's nest;
Yoimg meadows hasting their green
laps to fill
With golden dandelion and daffodil ;
These are fit sights for spring;
But, oh, tlioii hateful thing,"
What dost thou here?
Why, Death, what dost thou here.
This time o' year ?
Fair, at the old oak's knee,
The young anemone;
Fair, the plash places set
With dog-tooth violet;
The first sloop-sail.
The shad-flower pale;
Sweet are all sights,
Sweet ai'e all sounds of spring;
But tho;i, thou nglv thing.
What dost' thou here?
COOLIDOE.
813
Dark Death let fall a tear.
Why am I here ?
Oh, heart vnigrateful I Will man
never know
I am his friend, nor ever was his foe ?
Whose the sweet season, if it be not
mine "?
Mine, not the bobolink's, that song
divine.
Chasing the shadows o'er the flying
wheat !
"Tis a dead voice, not his, that sounds
so sweet.
AVHiose passionate heart burns in this
flaming rose
But his, whose passionate heart long
since lay still '?
Whose wan hope pales this snow-
like lily tall.
Beside the garden wall,
But his, whose radiant eyes and lily
grace,
.Sleep in the grave that crowns yon
tufted hill ?
All hope, all memory.
Have their deep springs in me;
And love, that else might fade,
By me immortal made.
Spurns at the grave, leaps to the wel-
coming skies.
And burns a steadfast star to stead-
fast eyes.
Susan Coolidge
(SARAH WOOLSEY).
ONE LESSER JOY.
What is the dearest happiness of
heaven ?
Ah , who shall say !
So many wonders, and so wondrous
fair.
Await the soul who, just arrived
there
In trance of safety, sheltered and for-
given,
Opens glad eyes to front the eter-
nal day:
Relief from earth's corroding discon-
tent.
Relief from pain,
The satisfaction of perplexing
fears,
Full compensation for the long,
hard years.
Full understanding of the Lord's in-
tent,
The things that were so ijuzzling
made quite plain:
And all astonished joy as, to the spot.
From further skies,
Crowd our beloved with white
winged feet.
And voices than the chiming harps
more sweet.
Faces whose fairness we had half for-
got,
And outstretched hands, and wel-
come in their eyes.
Heart cannot image forth the endless
store
AVe may but guess.
But this one lesser joy I hold my
own :
All shall be known in heaven ; at
last be known
The best and worst of me; the less
the more.
My own shall know — and shall not
love me less.
Oh, haunting shadowy dread which
underlies
All loving here!
We inly shiver as we whisper
low,
"Oh, if they knew — if they could
only know.
Could see our naked souls without
disguise —
How they would shrink from us
and pale with fear."
The bitter thoughts we hold in leash
within
But do not kill ;
The petty anger and the mean de-
sire,
The jealousy ^\hich burns — a
smouldering Are —
814
COOLIDQE.
The slimy trail of half-unnoted sin.
The sordid wish which daunts the
nobler will.
We fight each day with foes we dare
not name,
We fight, we fall!
Noiseless the conflict and unseen
of men ;
We rise, are beaten down, and rise
again,
And all the time we smile, we move
the same.
And even to dearest eyes draw close
the veil;
But in the blessed heavens these wars
are past ;
Disguise is o'er!
With new anointed vision, face to
face,
We shall see all, and clasped in
close embrace
Shall watch the haunting shadow flee
at last.
And know as we are known, and
fear no more.
MinACLE.
On ! not in strange portentous way
Christ's miracles were wrought of
old,
The common thing, the common clay
He touched and tinctured, and
straightway
It grew to glory manifold.
The barley loaves were daily bread
Kneaded and mixed with usual
skill;
\o care was given, no spell was said,
IJut when the Lord had blessed, they
fed
The multitude upon the hill.
The hemp was sown 'neath common
sun,
Watered by common dews and rain.
Of which the fisher's nets were spim;
Nothing was propliesied or done
To mark it from the other srain.
Coarse, brawny hands let down the
net
When the Lord spake and ordered
so;
They hauled the meshes, heavy-wet,
Just as in other days, and set
Their backs to labor, bending low ;
But quivering, leaping from the lake
The marvellous shining burdens
rise
Until the laden meshes break.
And all amazed, no man spake
But gazed with wonder in his eyes.
So still, dear Lord, in every place
Thou standest by the toiling folk,
With love and pity in Thy face.
And givest of Thy help and grace
To those who meekly bear the yoke.
Not by strange sudden change and
spell,
]5affling and darkening nature's
face ;
Thou takest the things we know so
well
And bulkiest on them Thy miracle —
The heavenly on the common-place.
The lives which seem so poor, so low,
The hearts which are so cramped
and dull,
The baffled hopes, the impulse slow,
Thou takest, touchest all, and lo!
They blossom to the beautiful.
We need not wait for thunder-peal
Kesounding from a moimt of fire
While round our daily paths we feel
Thy sweet love and Thy power to heal
Working in us Thy full desire.
INFL UEXCE.
Couched in the rocky lap of hills
The lake's blue waters gleam.
And thence in linked and measured
rills
Down to the valley stream.
To rise again, led higher and higher,
And slake the city's hot desire.
Ilii^li as the lake's bright ripples shine
iSo high the water goes ;
But not a drop that air-drawn line
Passes or overflows.
Though man may strive and man
may woo,
The stream to its own law is true.
Vainly the lonely tarn, its cup
Holds to the feeding skies;
Unless the source be lifted up.
The streandets cannot rise.
By law inexorably blent.
Each is the other's measurement.
Ah, lonely tarn! ah, striving rill!
So yearn these souls of ours.
And beat with sad and m-gent will
Against the unheeding i)owers.
In vain is longing, vain is force,
No stream goes higher than its som'ce.
Henry S, Cornwell
THE SPIDEH.
Spinner of the silken snare,
Fell Arachne in your lair.
Tell me, if your powers can tell
How you do your work so well ?
Weaving on in light and dark,
Segment and concentric arc.
Lace-like, gossamer designs.
Strict to geometric lines ;
Perfect to the utmost part,
Occult, exquisite of art, —
How are all these wonders bred
In your atom of a head ?
Propositions here involved
Wit of man has never solved;
Demonstrations hard to find
A.re as crystal to your mind.
How in deepest dungeon-glooms.
Do your Lilliputian looms
Work such miracles as these, —
Faultless, fairy filigrees ?
Careless flies that hither flit
Come to die ; but there you sit.
Feeling with your lingers fine
Each vibrating, pulse-like line;
Eager to anticipate
Hourly messages of fate, —
Fimeral telegrams that say
Here is feasting one more day?
Spider, only He can tell
How you do your work so well,
Who in life's mysterious ways
Knows the method of the maze.
THK U/iAGO^'-FLr.
When brooks of summer shallow
run.
And fiercely glows the ardent sun ;
Where waves the blue-flag tall and
dank.
And water-weeds grow rich and
rank,
The flaunting dragon-fly is seen,
A winged spindle, gold and green.
Born of the morning mists and
dews,
He darts — a flash of jewelled hues —
Athwart the waterfall, and flings,
P^rom his twice-duplicate wet wings,
Diamonds and sapphires such as
gleam
And vanish in a bridesmaid's dream!
Sail not, O dragon-fly. too near
The lakelet's bosom, dark and clear!
For, lurking in its deptlis below.
The hungry trout, thy fatal foe.
Doth watch to snatch thee, unaware.
At once from life, and light and air!
O brilliant fleck of siunmer's prime.
Enjoy thy brief, fleet span of time!
Full soon chill autumn's frosty
breath
Shall blow for thee a wind of death.
And dash to dust thy gaudy sheen —
Thy glittering mail of gold and
green !
81G
COXE — CRASHA W.
Arthur Cleveland Coxe.
WATCHWORDS.
We are living — we are dwelling
In a grand and awful time ;
In an age, on ages telling,
To be living — is sublime.
Hark ! the waking np of nations,
Gog and Magog to the fray :
Hark! what soundeth, is creation's
Groaning for its latter day.
Hark ! the onset ! will you fold yom-
Faith-clad arms in lazy lock ?
Up, oh, up ! for, dro^\•sy soldier.
Worlds are charging to the shock.
Worlds are charging — heaven be-
holding!
You have but an hour to fight:
Xow, the blazoned cross unfolding,
• On — right onward, for the right!
What! still hug your dreamy slum-
bers ?
'Tis no time for idling play,
Wreaths, and dance, and poet-num-
bers.
Flout them, we must work to-day !
Oh! let all the soid within you
For the truth's sake go abroad!
Strike ! let every nerve and sinew
Tell on ages — tell for God!
Richard Crashaw.
LIXES OX A PltAYEn-BOOK SEXT
TO MRS. n.
Lo! here a little volume, but large
book,
(Fear it not, sweet.
It is no hypocrite)
Much larger in itself than in its look.
It is, in one rich handful, heaven and
all —
Heaven's royal hosts encamp' d thus
small ;
To prove that true, schools used to
tell,
A thousand angels in one point can
dwell.
It is love's great artillery.
Which here contracts itself, and
comes to lie
Close couched in yoiu' white bosom,
and from thence,
As from a snowy fortress of de-
fence,
Against the gliostly foe to take your
part.
And fortify the hold of your chaste
heart;
It is the armory of light :
Let constant use but keep it bright.
You'll find it yields
To holy hands and hiunble hearts,
More swords and shields
Than sin hath snares or hell hath
darts.
Only be sure
The hands be pure
That hold these weapons, and the
eyes
Those of turtles, chaste and true,
Wakeful and wise.
Here is a friend shall fight for
you.
Hold but this book before your
heart.
Let prayer alone to play his part.
But oh ! the heart
That studies this high art
Must be a sure housekeeper,
And yet no sleeper.
Dear soul, be strong,
Mercy will come ere long.
And bring her bosom full of bless-
ings —
Flowers of nevei- fading graces.
To make immortal dressings,
For worthy souls whose wise
embraces
Store up themselves for Him who is
alone
The spouse of virgins, and the virgin's
son.
DE VERE — DODOE.
817
But if the noble Bridegroom, when
He come,
Shall find the wandering heart from
home,
Leaving her chaste abode
To gad abroad
Amongst the gay mates of the god of
flies;
To take her pleasure and to play,
And keep the devil's holiday;
To dance in the smishine of some
smiling
But beguiling
Sphere of sweet and sugared lies ;
Of all this hidden store
Of blessings, and ten thousand more
Doubtless he will unload
Himself some other where;
And pour abroad
His precious sweets.
On the fair soul whom first he meets.
O fair! O fortunate! O rich! O dear!
O ! happy, and thrice happy she.
Dear silver- breasted dove,
AVhoe'er she be,
Whose early love.
With winged vows.
Makes haste to meet her morning
spouse.
And close with his immortal kisses!
Happy soul ! who never misses
To improve that precious hour;
And every day
Seize her sweet prey.
All fresh and fragrant as he rises.
Dropping with a balmy shower,
A delicious dew of spices.
Oh ! let that happy soul hold fast
Her heavenly armful : she shall taste
At once ten thousand paradises :
She shall have power
To rifle and deflower
The i-icli and rosal spring of those
rare sweets.
Which with a swelling bosom there
she meets;
Boundless and infinite, bottomless
treasures
Of pure inebriating pleasures.
Happy soul ! she shall discover
What joy, what bliss.
How many heavens at once it is
To have a God become her lover.
Mary Ainge De Verb.
A LOVE SONG.
His love hath filled my life's fair cup
Full to its crystal brim ;
The dancing bubbles crowding up
Are dreams of him,
I work, and every thread I draw
Sets in a thought, —
The letter of I^ove's tender law
In patience wrought.
I serve his meals, — the fruit and
bread
Are sound and sweet :
But that invisible feast I spread
For gods w^ere meet !
I pray for him. All else I do
Fades far away
Before the thrill that smites me
through,
The while I pray :
Ah, God, be good to him, my own.
Who, on my breast.
Sleeps, with soft dimpled hands out-
thrown,
A child at rest!
Mary B. Dodge.
LOSS.
I LOST my treasures one by one,
Those joys the world holds dear;
Smiling, I said " To-morrow's sun
Will bring us better cheer,"
For faith and love were one. Glad
faith !
All loss is naught save loss of faith.
My truant joys come trooping back,
And troo]>ing friends no less;
But tears fall fast to meet the lack
Of dearer happiness.
For faith and love are two. Sad
faith !
'Tis loss indeed, the loss of faith.
John Donne.
THE FAREWELL.
As virtuous men pass mildly away,
And whisper to their souls to go;
AVhilst some of tlieir sad friends do
say,
The breatli goes now — and some say,
no;
So let us melt and make no noiso,
No tear-tloods, nor sigh-temiiests
move;
'Twere profanation of our joys
To tell the laity our love.
Moving of th' earth brings harms and
fears,
Men reckon what it did, and meant:
But trepidation of the spheres,
Though greater far is innocent.
Dull, suhlunarj^ lovers' love
'(Whose soul is sense) cannot admit
Absence, because it doth remove
Those tilings which alimented it.
But we're by love so much refined,
Tliat ourselves know not what it is,
Inter-assured of the mind.
Careless eyes, lips, and hands to miss.
Our two souls, therefore (which are
one),
Though I nuist go, endure not yet
A breach, but an expansion.
Like gold to airy tliinuess beat.
If they be two, they are two so
As stiff twin compasses are two ;
Thy soul, the fixed foot, makes no
sliow
To move, but doth, if th' other do.
And though it in the centre sit,
Y(>t when the other far doth roam,
It leans, and hearkens after it.
And grows erect as that cojues home.
Such wilt thou be to me, who must
Like th' other foot, obliquely run ;
Thy firnmess makes my circles just,
-Vnd makes me end where I begvui.
Henry Ripley Dorr.
DOOR AND WINDOW.
There is a room, a stately room,
Now filled with light, now wrapped
in gloom.
There is a door, a steel-clad door.
Lined with masses of hammered ore,
Closed with a lock of Titan weight,
Opened only by hand of Fate !
There is a window, broad and old,
Barred with irons of massive mould ;
Back from the window, closed and
fast,
Stretches the vista of the Past ;
A lengthening vista, faint and dim.
Reaching beyond the horizon's rim.
Men may wait at the window-sill
And listen, listen — but all is still.
Men may wait till their hairs are
Avhite,
Through the hours of day and night ;
Men may shower their tears like
rain
And mourn that they cannot pass
again ;
Over the pathway of the Past ;
But travelled first, it is travelled last !
Turn Avith me to the iron door
Many a mortal has stood before!
Lift the latch ? It is fastened down !
The hinges are flecked with a rusty
brown.
Batter away at its massive plates!
Hark! do you hear the mocking
Fates ?
'Tis only the echoes that go and
come
Like the measured beats of a muffled
drum !
DYER.
819
Your hands are bleeding ? Then
come away,
Perhaps, at length, you have learned
to-day
That only when under the grass or
snow
We learn what mortals must die to
know ;
That only when we are still and
cold
The door swings wide on its hinges
old!
Sir Edward Dyer.
MY MIXD TO ME A KINGDOM IS.
My mind to me a kingdom is ;
.Such perfect joy tlierein I find
As far exceeds all earthly bliss
That God or Nature hath assigned ;
Though much I want that most
would have.
Yet still my mind forbids to crave.
Content I live ; this is my stay.
I seek no more than may suffice.
I press to bear no haughty sway ;
Look, what I lack my mind sup-
plies.
Lo! tlius I triumph like a king!
Content with that my mind doth
bring.
I see how plenty surfeits oft.
And hasty climbers soonest fall;
I see that such as sit aloft
Mishap doth threaten most of all.
These get with toil, and keep with
fear ;
Such cares my mind could never
bear.
No princely pomp nor wealthy store.
No force to win the victory.
No wily Avit to salve a sore,
No shape to win a lover's eye, —
To none of these I yield as thrall ;
For why, my mind de.spiseth all.
Some have too much, yet still they
crave ;
I little have, yet seek no more.
They are but poor, though much they
have ;
And I am rich with little store.
They poor, I rich ; they beg, 1 give :
They lack, I lend ; they pine, I live.
I laugh not at another's loss,
I grudge not at another's gain :
No worldly wave my mind can toss ;
I brook that is another's bane.
I fear no foe, nor fawn on friend;
I loathe not life, nor dread mine end.
I joy not in no earthly bliss;
I weigh not Cra'sus' wealth a
straw ;
For care, I care not what it is :
I fear not fortune's fatal law;
My mind is such as may not move
For beauty bright, or force of love.
I wish but what I have at will ;
I M'ander not to seek for more :
Hike the plain, I climb no hill;
In greatest storms I sit on shore.
And laugh at them that toil in vain
To get what must be lost again.
I kiss not where I wish to kill ;
I feign not love where most I
hate ;
I break no sleep to win my will;
I wait not at the mighty's gate.
I scorn no poor, I fear no rich;
I feel no want, nor have too much.
The court nor cart I like nor loathe;
Extremes are counted worst of all ;
The golden mean betwixt them both
Doth surest sit, and fears no fall ;
This is my choice ; for why, I find
No wealth is like a quiet mind.
My wealth is health and perfect
ease ;
My conscience clear my chief de-
fence;
I never seek by bribes to please.
Nor by desert to give offence.
Thus do I live, thus will I die;'
Would all did so as well as 1 !
820
GALL A GHER — GA Y.
William D. Gallagher.
TWO APRILS.
When last the maple bud was swell-
ing?
When last the crocus bloomed
below,
Thy heart to mine its love was telling;
Thy soul with mine kept ebb and
flow :
Again the maple bud is swelling,
Again the crocus blooms below : —
In heaven thy heart its love is telling.
But still our souls keep ebb aiicl
flow.
When last the April bloom was fling-
ing
Sweet odors on the air of spring.
In forest aisles thy voice was ring-
ing,
Where thou didst with the red-bird
sing.
Again the April bloom is flinging
Sweet odors on the air of spring.
But now in heaven thy voice is ring-
ing?
Where thou dost with the angels
sing.
THE LAnORER.
Stand
•who
up, erect! Thou hast the
form
And likeness of thy God!
more '?
A soul as dauntless mid the storm
Of daily life, a heart as warm
And pure as breast e'er wore.
What then ? Thou art as true a man
As moves the human mass among;
As much a part of the great plan,
As Avith creation's dawn began,
As any of the throng.
Who is thine enemy ? The high
In station, or in wealth the chief ?
The great, who coldly pass thee by,
With proud step and averted eye ?
Xay ! ruu-se not such belief.
If true unto thyself thou wast.
What were the proud one's scorn to
thee ?
A feather, which thou mightest cast
Aside, as idly as the blast.
The light leaf from the tree.
No : — imcurbed passions, low desires,
Absence of noble self-respect.
Death, in the breast's consuming fires,
To that high nature which aspires
Forever, till thus checked ;
These are thine enemies — thy worst;
They chain thee to thy lonely lot:
Thy labor and thy lot accursed.
Oh ! stand erect, and from them burst,
And longer suffer not.
Thou art thyself thine enemy.
The great! what better they than
thou ?
As theirs, is not thy will as free?
Has God with equal favors thee
Neglected to endow.
True, wealth thou hast not — 'tis but
dust !
Nor place — uncertain as the wind !
But that thou hast, Avhich, with thy
crust
And water, may despise the lust
Of both — a noble mind.
With this, and passions under ban,
True faith, and holy trust in God,
Thou art the peer of any man.
Look up, then, that thy little span
Of life may be well trod.
William Wheeler Gay,
APOLLO DELVEDERE.
SuPKEME among a race of gods he
stands.
His strong limbs strained and
quivering with might;
His heart exulting, as his foemen's
bands
Before the dreadful «gis, melt in
flight.
OOSSE.
821
So once bestrode on red Scamander's
plain
Breasting at Hector's side the storm
of spears ;
Perchance in dreams he shakes the
shield again
And, shouting, fills the Grecian
host with fears.
Far-darting god of Homer, dost thou
dream
That Time still wears a crown of
sunny hair ?
That dawn-faced Daphne sings by
Peneus' stream,
And Dian routs the roebuck from
his lair ?
•
Know, shrineless god, that temples
sink to dust ;
Creeds moulder with the heart that
gave them birth ;
Time is a despot, and gods, even,
nuist
Bow to his will like mortals of the
earth.
Look close! the crowds that throng
this Belvedere
Are not gray-bearded elders laden
well
With costly gifts, from Athens sent
to hear
The fateful murmurs issue from thy
cell.
No longer now they tremble as they
stand
Before thy face, remembering
Niobe;
Nor reverence thee, but him whose
mortal hand
Gave thee the gift of immortality.
Edmund W. Gosse,
VILLANELLE.
WouLDST thou not be content to die
When low-lumg fruit is hardly
clinging
And golden autumn passes by ?
If we could vanish, thou and 1
While the last woodland bird is
singing,
Wouldst thou not be content to die ?
Deep drifts of leaves in the forest lie.
Red vintage that the frost is fling-
ing,
And golden autumn passes by.
Beneath this delicate, rose-gray sky.
While sunset bells are faintly ring-
inc
Wouldst thou not be content to die ?
For Avintry webs of mist on high
Out of the muffled earth are spring-
ino-
And golden autumn passes by.
Oh, now, when pleasures fade and fly.
And hope her southward flight "is
winging,
Wouldst thou not be content to die ?
Lest winter come, with wailing cry,
His cruel, icy bondage bringing,
AVhen golden autumn hath passed by,
And thou with many a tear and sigh.
While Life her wasted hands is
A\ringing,
Shalt pray in vain for leave to die
AVhen golden autumn hath passed by.
SUNSHINE IN MARCH.
Where are you, Sylvia, where ?
For our own bird the woodpecker, is
here.
Calling on you with cheerful tap-
pings loud !
The breathing heavens are full of
liquid light;
The dew is on the meadow like a
cloud ;
The earth is moving in her green
delight —
Her spiritual crocuses shoot through.
And rathe hepaticas in rose and blue;
But snow-drops that awaited you so
long
Died at the thrush's song.
822
ORAY.
" Aflieu, adieu!" they said,
" We saAY the skirts of glory fade;
We were the hopeless lovers of the
spring,
Too young, as yet, for any love of
ours ;
She is harsh, not having heard the
white-throats sing;
She is cold, not knowing the tender
April showers;
Yet have we felt her, as the buried
grain
May feel the rustle of the luifallen
rain;
We have known her, as the star that
sets too soon
Bows to the unseen moon."
David Gray.
DIE DOU'X, O DISMAL DA}'.
Die down, O dismal day, and let me
live;
And come, blue deeps, magnificently
strewn
With colored clouds, —large light,
and fugitive, —
By upper winds through pompous
motions blown.
Now it is death in life, — a vapor
dense
Creeps round my window till I cannot
see
The far snow-shining mountains and
the glens
Shagging the mountain-tops. O God !
make free
This barren shackled earth, so deadly
cold, —
Breathe gently forth thy spring, till
winter flies
In rude amazement, fearful and yet
bold,
While she performs her customed
charities;
I weigh the loaded hours till life is
bare, —
O God, for one clear day, a snowdrop,
and sweet air!
IF IT MUST BE.
If it must be — if it must be, O
God!
That I die young and make no further
moans;
That underneath the unrespective
sod.
In unescutcheoned privacy, my bones
Shall crumble soon ; — then give me
strength to bear
The last convulsive throe of too
sweet breath !
I tremble from the edge of life, to
dare
The dark and fatal leap, having no
faith,
No gloriou^yearning for the Apoc-
alypse;
But like a child that in the niglit-
time cries
For light, I cry; forgetting the eclipse
Of knowledge and our human des-
tinies —
O peevish and uncertain soul ! obey
The law of patience till the Day.
WINTRY WEATHER.
O WINTEIJ, wilt thou nevei', never
go?
O summer, but I weary foi- thy
coming.
Longing once more to hear the Luggie
flow,
And frugal bees laboriously hum-
ming.
Now the east wind diseases the
infirm.
And I must crouch in corners from
rough weather.
Sometimes a winter sunset is a
charm —
When the fired clouds compacted,
burn together.
And the large sun dips red behind the
hills.
I, from my window can behold this
pleasure;
And the eternal moon what time she
fills
Her orb -with argent, treading a soft
measure,
GBA Y — HA VERGAL.
828
With queenly motions of a bridal
His eye is like a clear
mood,
Keen flame that searches thi-ough
Through the wide spaces of infini-
me; I must drop
tude.
Upon my stalk, I cannot reach his
sphere ;
To mine he cannot stoop.
I win not my desire.
Ellis Gray.
And yet I fail not of my guerdon ; lo !
A thousand flickering darts ami
SUNSHINE.
tongues of fire
Around me spread and glow ;
I SAT in a darkened chamber,
Near by sang a tiny bird ;
All rayed and crowned, I miss
Through all my deep pain and
sad-
No queenly state until the summer
ness,
wane.
A wonderful song I heard.
The hours flit by ; none knoweth of
my bliss,
The birdling bright sang in the
light
From out of a golden throat;
sun-
And none has guessed my pain ;
I follow one alone,
The song of love he was singing
r track the shadow of his steps, I
Grew sweeter with every note.
grow
Most like to him I love.
I opened my casement wider
Of all that shines below.
To welcome the song I heard ;
straight into my waiting bosom
rd.
Flew simshine and song and b
No longer I now am sighing;
Frances Ridley Havergal.
The reason canst thou divine ?
The birdling with me abideth,
A UTOBIOGRAPHY.
And sunshine and song are mine.
AtTTOBiOGRAPHY! So you Say,
So do I Ri>t believe!
For no men or women that live to-
day,
Be they as good or as bad as they
Dora Greenwell
may,
Ever would dare to leave
THE SUNFLOWER.
In faintest pencil or boldest inlc.
All they truly and really think:
Till the slow daylight pale,
What they have said and what they
A willing slave, fast bound to
one
have done.
above,
What they have lived and what they
I wait; he seems to speed,
and
have felt.
change, and fail ;
Under the stars or under the sun.
I know he will not move.
At the touch of a pen the dew-
drops melt,
I lift my golden orb
And the jewels are lost in the grass.
To his, unsmitten when the roses
die.
Though you count tlie blades as
And in my broad and burning
disk
you pass.
absorb
At the touch of a pen the lightninr;
The splendors of his eye.
is fixed,
824
HAVERGAL.
An innocent streak on a broken
cloud ;
And the thunder that pealed so
fierce and loud,
With musical echo is softly mixed.
Autobiography ? No !
It never was written yet, I trow.
Grant that they try !
Still they must fail !
Words are too pale.
For the fervor and glow of the lava-
flow.
Can they paint the Hash of an
eye?
How much less the flash of a heart.
Or its delicate ripple and glimmer
and gleam,
Swift and sparkling, suildenly dark-
ling.
Crimson and gold tints, exquisite
soul-tints.
Changing like dawn-flush touching
a dream !
Where is the art
That shall give the play of blending
lights
From the porphyry rock on the
pool below ?
Or the bird-shadow traced on the
sunlit heights
Of golden rose and snow ?
You say 'tis a fact that the books
exist.
Printed and published in Mudie's
list,
Some in two volumes, and some in
one —
Autobiographies plenty. But look !
I will tell you what is done
By the writers, conttdentially!
They cut little pieces out of their
lives
And join them together,
!\[aking them up as a readal)le book.
And call it an autobiography,
Though little enough of the life sur-
vives.
What if we went in the sweet May
weather
To a wood that 1 know which hangs
on a hill.
And reaches down to a tinkling
brook,
That sings the flowers to sleep at
night.
And calls them again with the earliest
light.
Under the delicate flush of green.
Hardly shading the bank below,
Pale anemones peep between
The mossy stumps where the
violets grow;
Wide clouds of bluebells stretch
away,
And primrose constellations rise, —
Turn where we may.
Some new loveliness meets our
eyes.
The first white butterflies flit around.
Bees are murnuuing close to the
ground.
The cuckoo's happy shout is heard.
Hark again !
Was it echo, or was it bird ?
All the air is full of song,
A carolling chorus aroimd and above:
From the wood-pigeon's call so soft
and long,
To merriest twitter and marvellous
trill,
Every one sings at his own sweet
will.
True to the key-note of joyous love.
Well, it is lovely I is it not ?
But Ave nuist not stay on the fairy
si)ot.
So wa gather a nosegay with care :
A primrose here and a- bluebell
there,
And something that we have never
seen.
Probably therefore a specimen
rare ;
Stitch wort, with stem of transparent
green.
The white-veined woodsorrel, and
a spray
Of tender-leaved and budding May.
We carry home the fragrant load.
In a close, warm hand, by a dusty
road ;
The sun grows hotter every hour;
Already the woodsorrel pines for the
shade ;
HAVER GAL.
825
We watch it fade,
And throw away the fairy little
flower ;
We forgot that it eoiild not last an
hour
Away from the cool moss where it
grows.
Then the stitch worts di'oop and close ;
There is notliing to show hut a tangle
of green,
For the white-rayed stars will no
more be seen.
Then the anemones, can they siu-
vive ?
Even now they are hardly alive.
Ha! where is it, our unknown spray ?
Dropped on the way !
Perhaps we shall never find one
again.
At last we come in with the few that
are left.
Of freshness and fragrance bereft;
A sorry display.
Now, do we say,
" Here is the wood where we rambled
to-day ?
See, we have brought it to you;
Believe us, indeed it is true.
This is the wood ! " do we say ?
So much for the bright and pleasant
side.
There is another. We did not bring
All that was hidden under the wing
Of the radiant plumageil sjidng.
AVe never tried
To spy, or watch, or away to bear.
Much that was just as truly thei'e.
What have we seen ?
Hush, ah, hush!
Curled and withered fern between.
And dead leaves unc\er the living
green.
Thick and damp. A clammy feather,
All that remains of a singing thrush
Killed by a weasel long ago.
In the hungry winter weather.
Nettles in unfriendly row.
And last year's brambles, sharp and
brown.
Grimly guarding a hawthorn crown.
A pale leaf trying to reach the light
By a long weak stem, but smothered
down.
Dying in darkness, with none to see.
The rotting trunk of a willow tree.
Leafless, ready to fall from the bank ;
A poisonous fungus, cold and white.
And a hemlock growing strong and
rank.
A tuft of fur and a ruddy stain.
Where a wounded hare has escaped
the snare.
Only i)erhaps to be caught again.
No specimens we bring of these.
Lest they should disturb our ease,
And spoil the story of the May,
And make you think our holiday
Was far less pleasant than we say.
All no! We write our lives indeed.
But in a cipher none can read.
Except the author. He may pore
The life-accunudating lore
For evermore.
And find the records strange and
true.
Bring wisdom old and new ;
But tliough he break the seal.
No power has he to give the key;
No license to reveal.
We wait the all-declaring day.
When love shall know as it is
known.
Till then, the secrets of our lives are
ours and God's alone.
SONG FROM " nrOHT."
Light after darkness,
Gain after loss.
Strength after suffering,
Crown after cross.
Sweet after bitter.
Song after sigh.
Home after wandering,
Praise after cry.
Sheaves after sowing.
Sun after rain,
Sigh after mystery,
Peace after pain.
Joy after sorrow,
Calm after blast,
Rest after weariness,
Sweet rest at last.
Xear after distant,
Gleam after gloom,
Love after loneliness,
Life after tomb.
After long agony.
Rapture of bliss!
Binlit was the pathway
Leading to this !
FliOm "MAKING POETUr:'
'Tis not stringing rhymes together
In a pleasant true accord ;
Not the music of the metre.
Not the happy fancies, sweeter
Than a flower-bell, honey-stored.
'T is the essence of existence,
Rarely rising to the light;
And the songs of echo longest.
Deepest, fullest, truest, strongest.
With your life-blood you will write.
With yotn- life-blood. None will
know it.
You will never tfll them how.
Smile! and they will never guess it:
Laugh! and you will not confess it
By your paler cheek and brow.
There must be the tightest tension
Ere the tone be full and true ;
Shallow lakelets of emotion
Are not like the spirit-ocean.
Which reflects the purest blue.
Every lesson you shall utter.
If the charge indeed be yours.
First is gained by earnest learning.
Carved in letters deep and burning
On a heart that long endures.
Day by day that wondrous tablet
Your life-poem shall receive.
By the hand of .Toy or Sorrow ;
But tlie pen can never borrow
Half the records that they leave.
You will only give a transcript
Of a life-line here and there.
Only just a spray-wreath springing
From the hidden depths, and flinging
Broken rainbows on the air.
Still, if you but copy truly.
'T will be poetry indeed,
Echoing many a heart's vibration;
Rather love than admiration
Earning as your priceless meed.
THE COL DE BALM.
Sunshine and silence on tlie Col de
Balm!
I stood above the mists, above the
rush
Of all the torrents, when one mar-
vellous hush
Filled God's great moimtain temple,
vast and calm.
With hallelujah light, as seen through
silent psalm: —
Crossed Avith one discord, only one.
For love
Cried out, and would be heard.
"If ye were here,
O friends, so far away and yet so
near.
Then were the anthem perfect!"
And the cry
Threaded the concords of that Alpine
harmony.
Not vain the same fond cry if first I
stand
Upon the mountain of our God, and
long.
Even in the gloiy and with His
new song
Upon my lips, that you should come
and share
The bliss of heaven, imperfect still
till all are there.
Dear ones ! shall it be mine to watch
you come
Up from the shadows and the val-
ley mist.
To tread the jacinth and the ame-
thyst;
To rest and sing upon the stormless
height,
In the deep calm of love and ever-
lasting light ?
HAYNE — IIILLARD.
^'11
Paul Hamilton Hayne.
LYRIC OF ACTIOX.
'Tis the part of a coward to brood
O'er the past that is withered and
dead :
What though the heart's roses are
aslies and dust ?
What though the heart's music be
fled?
Still shine the grand heavens o'er-
head,
Whence the voice of an angel thrills
clear on the soul,
" Gird about thee thine armor, press
on to the goal! "
If the faults or the crimes of thy
youth
Are a burden too heavy to bear,
What hope can rebloom on the deso-
late waste
Of a jealous and craven despair ?
Down! down with the fetters of
fear !
In the strength of thy valor and man-
hood arise.
With the faith that illumes and the
will that defies.
Too late! through God's infinite
world,
From His throne to life's nether-
most fires.
Too late is a phantom that flies at
the dawn
Of the soul that repents and as-
pires.
If pure thou hast made thy de-
sires,
There's no height the strong M'ings
of innnortals may gain
Which in striving to reach, thou shalt
strive for in vain.
Then up to the contest with fate.
Unbound by the past which is
dead!
What though the heart's roses are
ashes and dust ?
What though the heart's music be
fled?
ytill shine the fair heavens o'erhead;
And sublime as the angel that rules
in the sim
Bqams the promise of peace when the
conflict is won !
George Herbert.
FliOM THE "ELIXIR."
TEAf;ii me, my God and King,
In all things Thee to see.
And what I do in anything.
To do it as for Thee.
All may of Thee partake;
Nothing can be so mean
Which with this tincture, for Thy
sake.
Will not grow bright and clean.
A servant with this clause
Makes drudgery divine:
Who sweeps a room as for Thy laws.
Makes that and the action fine.
Aaron Hill.
HOW TO DEAL WITH COMMON
NATURES.
TENDER-handed stroke a nettle,
And it stings you for yoxn- pains ;
Grasp it like a man of mettle.
And it soft as silk remains.
'Tis the same with common natures:
Use them kindly, they rebel ;
But be rough as nutmeg-graters.
And the rogues obey you well.
F. A, HiLLARD.
THE POET'S PEN.
I A M an idle reed ;
I rustle in the whispering air;
I bear my stalk and seetl
Through spring-time's glow and sum-
mer's glare.
828
HOPKINS.
And in the fiercer strife
Wliich winter brings to ine amain,
Sapless, 1 waste my lite.
And, murmuring at my fate, com-
plain.
I am a worthless reed ;
No golden top have I for crown,
No flower for beauty's meed.
No wreath for poet's high renown.
Hollow and gaunt, my wand
hlirill whistles, bending in the gale;
Leafless and sad I stand,
And still neglected, still bewail.
O foolish reed ! to wail !
A poet came, with downcast eyes.
And, wandering through the dale.
Saw thee and claimed thee for his
prize.
He plucked thee from the mire ;
He pruned and made of thee a pen.
And wrote in words of Are
His flaming song to listening men ;
Till thou, so lowly bred,
Now wedded to a nobler state,
Utt'rest such pieans overhead
That angels listen at their gate.
Louisa Parsons Hopkins,
TEMPESTUOUS DEEPS.
Passionate, stormy ocean.
Spreading thine arms to me.
The depths of my soul's emotion
Surge with the surging sea:
Waves and billows go o'er me.
Give me thy strong right hand !
The throes of my heart's vain struggle
I know thou wilt imderstand.
Break with thy hidden anguish,
Kestless and yearning main !
Echo my sighs; I languish.
Moaning in secret pain.
The heart I had trusted fails me.
The hopes I would rest in, flee;
"Woe upon woe assails me.
Comfort me, answering sea !
Mightily tossed with tempest,
Lashed into serried crest.
Roaring and seething billows
Give thee nor peace nor rest :
Oh, to thy heaving bosom
Take me, wild sobbing sea !
For the whole earth's groaning and
travail
Utters itself in thee.
DECEMBER.
Blow, northern winds!
To bi'ace my fibres, knit my cords,
To gird my soul, to fire my words,
To do my work, — for 't is the
Lord's, —
To fashion minds.
Come, tonic blasts !
Arouse my courage, stir my thought.
Give nerve and spring, that as 1 ought
I give my strength to what is wrought.
While duty lasts.
Glow, arctic light.
And let my heart with burnished
steel.
That bright magnetic flame reveal
Which kindles purpose, faith, and
zeal
For truth and right.
Shine, winter skies !
That when each brave day's work is
done,
I wait in i^eace, from sun to sun,
To meet unshamed, through victory
won.
Your starry eyes.
[From Perxephonc]
EARLY SUMMER.
The chrysalid with rapture stirs;
The A\ater-beetle feels more nigh
His glory of the di-agon-fly.
And nectar fills the flower-spurs.
Down in the confidential green
Of clover-fields the insects hum,
AVhile myriad creatures pipe and
drum.
And live their busy life unseen.
HOPKINS.
829
The flowers of the Indian corn
Droop their fair feathers o'er the
sheatli,
And all their pollen grains bequeath
That golden harvests may be born.
[From Persephone.]
LATE SUMMER.
The summer-tide swells high and
full;
I sit within the waving grass;
The scented breezes o'er me pass,
The thistles shed their silky wool.
The ox-eyed daisies hail the sun,
And sprinkle all the acres bright
With golden stars of radiant light
Amid the feathery grasses dun.
The plaintive brook reflects the glow
Of rows of bleeding cardinal;
The whippoorwill's sweet madrigal
Breathes through the sunset soft and
low.
I see the dear Persephone
Trailing her piu-ple robes more
slow,
Her lovely eyelids drooping low,
And gazing pensive o'er the sea.
The fringed gentians kiss her hand,
The milkweed waves its soft adieus ;
Theirtender words she must refuse,
For dark steeds wait upon the strand.
[From Persephone.']
AUTUMN.
Ereavhile the sap has had its will,
The bud has opened into leaf
The grain is ripening for the sheaf,
Demeter's arms have had their fill.
The seed has dropped into the mould,
The flower all its petals shed.
The rattling stalksaredry and dead,
Persephone is still and cold.
For Nature's dream is all fulfilled.
Her clinging robes she folds once
more.
And glides within her close-locked
door,
For all the wine of life is spilled.
HYMN FROM ''MOTHERHOOD."
BEAUTIFUL new life within my
bosom,
New life, love-born, more beautiful
than day.
1 tremble in thy sacred presence,
knowing
What holy miracle attends my
way!
My heart is hushed, I hear between
its beating
The angel of annunciation say,
"Hail, blessed among women!"
while I pray.
O all-creative Love ! thy finger
touches
My leaping pulses to diviner heat.
What am I. that thy thought of life
should blossom
In me, in me thy tide of life should
beat ?
Beat strong within me, God-tide, in
high passion.
With quickening spirit earth-born
essence greet!
Fountain of life! flow through me
pure and sweet.
O all-sustaining Love! come close
beside me, —
Me, so unworthy of this wondrous
gift.
Purge me, refine me, try me as by
fire,
Whiten me white as snow in gla-
cier-rift,
That neither spot, nor stain nor
blemish darken
These elements that now to being
drift:
Inspire, sustain me, all my soul
uplift!
830
HUTCHINSON —JACKSON.
O all-sufficient Love ! I am as
nothing;
Take me, thy way, most facile to
thy need;
Enraptured, let me feel thy spirit
moulding
The gei-m that thou hast made a
living seed.
And while the currents of my life are
speeding
This life immortal in its growth to
feed.
To one dear purpose, all my forces
lead!
Ellen Mackay Hutchinson.
SEA-WAY.
The tide slips up the silver sand,
Dark night and rosy day ;
It brings sea-treasures to the land.
Then bears them all away.
On mighty shores from east to west
It wails, and gropes, and cannot
rest.
O tide, that still doth ebb and
flow
Through niglit to golden day: —
Wit, learning, beauty, come and go.
Thou giv'st — thou tak'st away.
But sometime, on some gracious
shore,
Thou shalt lie still and ebb no more.
ON THE nOAD.
UosT know the way to Paradise ?
Pray, tell me by thy grace.
'• Any way thou canst devise
That leads to my love's face —
For that's his dwelling-place."
How far is it to Paradise ?
"Ah, that I cannot say;
Time loiters and my heart it flies -
A minute seems a day
Whene'er I go that way."
THE PRINCE.
Septembek waves his golden-rod
Along the lanes and hollows,
And saunters round the sunny fields
A-playing with the swallows.
The corn has listened for his stei),
The maples blush to greet him.
And gay coquetting Sumach dons
Her velvet cloak to meet him.
Come to the hearth, O merry prince,
With flaming knot and ember ;
For all your ti'icks of frosty eves,
We love your ways, September!
AUTUMN SONG.
Red leaf, gold leaf,
Flutter down the wind:
Life is brief, oh! life is Ijrief,
But Mother Earth is kind;
From her dear bosom ye shall spring
To new blossoming.
The red leaf, the gold leaf.
They have had their way;
Love is long if life be brief, —
Life is but a day;
And love from grief and death shall
spring
To new blossoming.
Helen Jackson
(II. II.).
THE LAST WORDS.
[The last words written by Dr. Holland,
Oct. lull, 18S1, — referring to President
Garfield: " By sympathy he drew all hearts
to him."] I.
We may not choose! Ah, if we
might, how we
Shotdd linger here, not ready to be
dead,
Till one more loving thing were
looked, or said, —
Till some dear child's estate of joy
should be
Complete, — or we triumphant, late,
should see
JACKSON.
831
Some great cause win for which our
hearts had bled. —
Some hope come true which all our
lives had fed, —
Some bitter soi-row fade away and flee,
Which we, rebellious, had too bitter
thought ;
Or even, — so our human hearts
would cling,
If but they might, to this fair world
inwrought
With heavenly beauty in each small-
est thing,
We would refuse to die till we had
sought
One violet more, heard one more
robin sing!
We may not choose : but if we did
foreknow
The hour when we should pass from
human sight,
What words were tast that w^e should
say, or write.
Could we pray fate a sweeter boon
to show
Than bid our last words burn with
loving glow
Of heartfelt praise, to lift, and make
more bright
A great man's memory, set in clearer
light ?
Ah yes! Fate could one boon more
sweet bestow :
So frame those words that every
heart which knew,
Should sudden, awe-struck, weeping
turn away.
And cry: "His own hand his best
wreath must lay !
Of his own life his own last words
are true.
So true, love's truth no truer thing
can say, —
" By sympathy, all hearts to him he
drew. "
MARCH.
Month which the warring ancients
strangely styled
The month of war, — as if in their
fierce ways
AVere any month of j^eace! — in thy
rough days,
I find no war in nature, though the
wild
Winds clash and clang, and broken
boughs are piled
At feet of writhing trees. The violets
raise
Their heads without affright, or look
of maze,
And sleep through all the din, as
sleeps a child.
And he who watches well, will well
discern
Sweet expectation in each living
thing.
Like pregnant mother, the sweet
earth doth yearn ;
In secret joy makes ready for the
spring;
And hidden, sacred, in her breast
doth bear
Annunciation lilies for the year.
JUL Y.
Some flowers are withered and some
joys have died;
The garden reeks with an East Indian
scent
From beds where gillyflowers stand
weak and spent;
The white heat pales the skies from
side to side ;
At noonday all the living creatures
hide;
But in still lakes and rivers, cool,
content.
Like starry blooms on a new firma-
ment.
White lilies float and regally abide.
In vain the cruel skies their hot rays
shed;
The lily does not feel their brazen
glare;
In vain the pallid clouds refuse to
share
Their dews; the lily feels no thirst,
no dread;
Unharmed she lifts her queenly face
and head ;
She drinks of living waters and keeps
fair.
832
JENNISON.
MY NASTUliTIUMS.
Quaint blossom with the old fantas-
tic name,
By jester christened at some an-
cient feast!
How royally to-day among tlie least
Considered herbs, it flings its spice
and flame.
How careless wears a velvet of the
same
Unfathomed red, which ceased
when Titian ceased
To paint it in the robes of doge and
priest.
Oh, long lost loyal red which never
came
Again to painter's palette — on my
sight
It flashes at this moment, trained
and poured
Thi'ough my nasturtiums in the
morning light.
Like great-souled kings to kingdoms
full restored.
They stand alone and draw them to
their height,
And shower me from their stintless
golden hoard.
Lucia W. Jennison
(OWEN INNSLY).
IN A LETTER.
Titp:ue came a breath, out of a dis-
tant time.
An odor from neglected gardens
where
Unnumbered roses once perfumed
the air
Through summer days, in cliild-
hood's bappy clime.
There came the salt scent of the sea,
the chime
Of waves against the beaclies or the
bare,
ftaunt rocks; as to the mind, half
unaware.
Recur the words of some familiar
rhyme.
And as above the gardens and the
sea
The moon arises, and her silver light
Touches the landscape with a deeper
grace.
So o'er the misty wraitlis of memory,
Turning them into pictures clear
and bright,
Eose in a halo tlie beloved face.
HEIt ROSES.
Against her mouth she pressed the
rose, and there,
'Neath the caress of lips as soft and
red
As its own i)etals, quick the bright
bud spread
And oped, and flung its fragrance on
the air.
It ne'er again a bud's young grace
can wear ?
O love, regret it not! It gladly
shed
Its soul for thee, and though thou
kiss it dead
It does not murnuu' at a fate so
fair.
Thus, once, thou breath' dst on me,
till every germ
Of love and song "broke into raptu-
rous flower,
And sent a challenge upwards to the
sky.
What if too swift fruition set a
term
Too brief to all things ? I have lived
my hour.
And die contented since for thee I
die.
OUTllE-AfOnT.
Suppose the dreaded messenger of
death
Should hasten steps that seem,
thongh sure, so slow.
And soon should whisper with his
chilly breath:
"Arise! thine hour has sounded,
thou must go;
JENNISON.
833
For they that earliest taste life's holi-
est feast
Must early fast, lest, grown too bold,
they d are ■
Of tlieiu that follow after seize the
share."
Then, though my pulse's beat forever
ceased,
If where I slumbered thou shouldst
chance to pass
Thovigh grave-bound, I thy presence
should discern.
Heedless of coffin-lid and tangled
grass.
Upward to kiss thy feet my lips
would yearn;
And did one spark of love thy heart
inflame.
With the old rapture I should call
tliv name.
DEPENDENCE.
What would life keep for me if
thou shouldst go ?
Beloved, give me answer; for my
art
Is pledged unto thy service, and my
heart
Apart from thee nor joy nor grace
doth know.
No arid desert, no wide waste of
snow.
Looks drearier to exiled ones who
start
On their forced journey than,
shouldst thou depart,
This fair green earth to my dead
hope would show.
And like a drowning man who strug-
gling clings
With stiffened fingers to the rope
that saves.
Thrown out to meet his deep need
from the land.
So to thy thought I hold when
sorrow's wings
Darken the sky, and 'mid the bitter-
est waves
Of fate am succored by thy friendly
hand.
AT SEA.
What lies beyond the far horizon's
rim ?
Ah! could our ship but reach and
anchor there.
What wondrous scenes, what visions
bright and fair
Would meet the eyes that gazed
across the brim!
ijut though we crowd the canvass
on and trim
Our barque with skill, the proud
waves seem to bear
No nearer to that goal, and every-
where
Stretches an endless circle wide and
dim,
>So we do dream, treading the narrow
path
Of life, between the bounds of day
and night.
To-morrow turns this page so often
conned.
But when to-morrow cometh, lo! it
hath
The limits of to-day, and in its
light
Still lies far off the unknown heaven
beyond.
We sail the centre of a ceaseless
round.
Forever circled by the horizon's rim;
And fondly deem that from that far-
off brim
Some sign will rise or some glad ti-
dings sound.
But no word comes, nor aught to
break the bound
Of sea and sky all day with distance
dim.
And vanished quite when darkness,
chill and grim.
About the deep her sable shroud has
wound.
So on the seas of life and time we
drift.
Within the circling limits of om-
fate,
Expectant ever of some solving
breath.
But no sound comes, no pitying hand
doth lift
834
JOHNSON— JOYCE.
The veil nor faith nor love can i^en-
etrate.
And to our dusk succeeds the dark
of death.
Robert U. Johnson.
AY SOVEMnEU.
Heke is the water-shed of all the
year,
Where by a thought's space,
thoughts do start anear
That fare most widely forth: some
to the mouth
Of Arctic rivers, some to the mellow
South.
The gaunt and wrinkled orchard
shivers 'neath
The blast, like Lear upon the English
heath,
And mossy boughs blow wild that,
imdistressed.
Another spring shall hide the cheer-
ful nest.
All things are nearer from this chilly
crown, —
The solitude, the white and huddliug
town ;
And next the russet fields, of harvest
shorn.
Shines the new wheat that freshens
all the morn.
From out the bursting milkweed,
dry and gray,
The silken argosies are launched
away.
To mount the gust, or drift from hill
to hill
And plant new colonies by road and
rill.
Ah, wife of mine, whose clinging
hand I liold,
Shrink you before the new, or at
the old •?
And those far eyes that hold the si-
lence fast —
Look they upon the Future, or the
Past ''
Robert Dwyer Joyce.
KlLiOLEMAN CASTLE.
KiLfOLEMAX Castle, an ancient and
very picturesque ruin, once the residence
of Spenser, lies on the shore of a small
lake, about two miles to the west of iJone-
raile, in the county of Cork. Jt belonged
ouce to the Karls of Desmond, and was
burned by their followers in 1.598. Spenser,
who was hated by the Irish inconsequence
of his stringent advices to the English
about the management of the refractory
chiefs and nunstrels, narrowly escaped
with his life, and an infant child of his,
unfortunately left behind, w'as burnt to
death in the flames.
No sound of life was coming
From glen or tree or brake.
Save the bittern's hollow booming
Up from tlie reedy lake;
The golden light of sunset
Was swallowed in the deep,
And the night came down with a
sullen frown,
On Houra's craggy steep.
And Houra's hills are soundless:
But hark, that trumpet blast!
It tills the forest boimdless.
Rings roimd the summits vast;
'Tis answered by another
From the crest of Corrin Mor,
And hark again the pipe's wild strain
By Bregoge's caverned shore!
Oh. sweet at hush of even
The trumpet's golden thrill;
Grand 'neath the starry heaven
The pibroch wild and shrill ;
Yet all were pale with terror.
The fearfid and the bold,
Who heard its tone that twilight lone
In the poet's frowning hold !
Well might their hearts be beating;
For up the mountain pass,
By lake and river meeting
Came kern and galloglass.
Breathing of vengeance deadly,
Under the forest tree.
To the wizard man who had cast the
ban
On the minstrels bold and free!
They gave no word of warning,
Kound still tliey came, and on.
Door, wall, and ramparts scorning,
They knew not he was gone!
Gone fast and far that even,
All seci'ctas the wind.
His treasures all in that castle tall,
And his infant son behind!
All still that castle hoarest;
Their pipes and horns were still,
While gazed they through the forest,
Up glen and northern hill;
Till from the Brehou circle,
On Corrin's crest of stone,
A sheet of fire like an Indian pyre
Up to the clouds was thrown.
Then, with a mighty blazing,
They answered — to the sky;
It dazzled their own gazing,
So bright it rolle
nie!
Tak tent the lesson be wisely sped ;
For gold or gear waste not life's
sweetness.
Better love's roses white and red."
PALFREY— PRENTICE.
847
Sarah Hammond Palfrey
(e. foxtox).
THE CHILD'S PLEA.
Because I wear the swaddling-bands
of time,
Still mark and watch me,
Eternal Father, on Thy throne sub-
lime,
Lest Satan snatch me.
Because to seek Thee I have yet to
learn,
Come down and lead me ;
Because I am too weak my bread to
earn,
My Father, feed me.
Because I grasp at things that are
not mine,
And might undo me,
Give, from thy treasure-house of
goods divine.
Good gifts imto me.
Because too near the pit I creeping
go,
Do not forsake me.
To climb into Thine arms I am too
low ;
O Father, take me !
THE LI GUT-HOUSE.
O'er waves that murmur ever nigh
I\Iy window opening toAvard the
deep,
T!ie hght-liouse, Avith its wakeful eye
Looks into mine, that shuts to
sleep.
I lose myself in idle dreams.
And wake in smiles or sighs or
fright
According to my vision's themes,
And see it shining in the night.
Forever there and still the same;
"While many more, besides me,
mark, —
On various course, with various
aim, —
That light that shineth in the dark.
It draws my heart towards those
who roam
Unknown, nor to be known by me;
I see it and am glad, at home.
They see it, and are safe at sea.
On slumbrous, thus, or watching
eyes.
It shines through all the dangerous
night ;
Until at length the day doth rise.
And light is swallowed up of light.
Light of the world, incarnate Word,
So shin'st thou through our night
of time,
Whom freemen love to call their Lord,
O Beacon, steadfast and sublime !
And men of every land and speech.
If but they have Thee in their
sight.
Are bound to Thee, and each to each.
Through thee, by countless threads
of light.
George Dennison Prentice.
THE RIVER IS THE MAMMOTH
CA VE.
O DAr.K, mysterious stream, I sit 1)y
thee
In awe profound, as myriad wander-
ers
Have sat before. I see thy waters
move
From out the ghostly glimmerings of
ray lamp
Into the dark beyond, as noiselessly
As if thou wert a sombre river drawn
Upon a spectral canvas, or tli(> stream
Of dim Oblivion flowing through the
lone
And shadowy vale of death. There
is no wave
To whisper on thy shoie, or breathe
a wail,
Wounding its tender bosom on thy
sharp
848
REDDEN.
And jagged rocks. Iniuinierons min-
gled tones.
The voices of the day and of the
night,
Are ever heard tlirough all our outer
world,
For Nature there is never dumb ; but
here
I turn and turn my listening ear, and
catch
No mortal sound, save that of my
own heart,
That 'mid the awful stillness throbs
aloud.
Like the far sea-surf's low and meas-
ured beat
Upon its rocky shore. But when a
cry.
Or shout, or song is raised, how
wildly back
Come the weird echoes from a thou-
sand rocks.
As if unnumbered airy sentinels.
The genii of the spot, caught up the
voice.
Repeating it in wonder — a wild maze
Of spirit-tones, a wilderness of
sounds,
Earth-born but all unearthly.
Thou dost seem,
O wizard stream, a river of the dead —
A river .of some blasted, perished
world.
Wandering forever in the mystic
void.
No breeze e'er strays across thy
solemn tide;
No bird e'er breaks thy surface with
his wing ;
No star, or sky, or bow, is ever
glassed
Within tliy depths ; no flower or blade
e'er breathes
Its fragrance from thy bleak banks
on the air.
True, here are flowers, or semblances
of flowers,
Carved by the magic fingers of the
drops
Tlaat fall upon thy rocky battle-
ments —
Fair roses, tulips, pinks, and violets —
All white as cerements of the coflined
dead ;
But they are flowers of stone, and
never drank
The sunshine or the dew. O sombre
stream,
Whence comest thou, and whither
goest? Far
Above, upon the surface of old Earth,
A hundred rivers o'er thee pass and
sweep.
In music, and in sunshine, to the
sea; —
Thou art not born of them. Whence
comest thou,
And whither goest '? None of earth
can know.
No mortal e'er has gazed upon thy
source —
No mortal seen where thy dark
waters blend
With tlie abyss of Ocean. None may
guess
The mysteries of thy course. Per-
chance thou hast
A hundred mighty cataracts, thun-
dering down
Toward Earth's eternal centre; but
their sound
Is not for ear of man. All we can
know
Is that thy tide rolls out, a spectre
stream.
From yon stupendous, frowning wall
of rock,
And, moving on a little way, sinks
down
Beneath another mass of rock as
dark
And frowning, even as life — our
little life —
Born of one fathomless eternity,
Steals on a moment and then disap-
pears
In an eternity as fathomless.
Laura C. Redden
(lIOWAKI) GLYNDON).
FAIR AND FIFTEEX.
She is tlie east just ready for the sun
Upon a cloudless morning. Oh,
her cheek
Hath caught the trick of that first,
deUcate straak
Which says earth's light-ward foot-
steps have begun !
And still her brow is like some Arctic
height
Which never knows the full, hot
flush of noon ;
She wears the seal of May and not
of June ;
She is tlie new day, furthest off from
night!
Luring in promise of all daintiest
sweetness :
A bud with crimson rifting througli
its green ;
The large, clear eyes, so shy their
lids between
Give hints of tliis dear wonder's near
completeness.
For, when the bud is fair and full,
like this,
We know that there will be a queen
of roses,
Before her cloister's emerald gate
uncloses.
And her true knight unlocks her with
a kiss I
And gazing on the young moon,
fashioned sliglitly,
A silver cipher inlaid on the blue.
For all that she is strange and slim
and new,
We know that she will grow in glory
nightly.
And dear to loving eyes as that first
look
The watcher getteth of the far
white sail.
This new light on her face; she
doth prevail
Upon us like a rare, unopened book !
Helen Rich,
FilLENT MOTIIEnS.
I woxDER. cliild, if, when you cry
To me, in such sore agony
As I moaned "Mother!" yesterday,
I shall not find some gracious way.
Of comforting my little May !
If, Avlien you kiss my silent lips,
They will not pass from death's
eclipse
To smile in peace I then shall know,
That waits where tired mothers go —
Ay, kiss and bless you soft and low ?
If my poor children's grief will fail
To stir the white and frosty veil
That hides my secret from their eyes.
Shall I not turn from Paradise
To still the tempest of their sighs ?
Oh ! patient hands, that toil to keep
The wolf at bay while children sleep,
That smooth each flossy tangled
tress.
And thrill witli mother happiness ;
Have they not soon the power to
bless ?
I think the sting of death must be
Resigning Love's sweet mastery;
To bid our little ones '' Good night,"
And even with all Heaven in sight.
To turn from home and its delight.
Hiram Rich.
STILL TEXANTED.
Old house, how desolate thy life!
Xay, life and death alike have fled;
Nor thrift, nor any song within,
Xor daily thought for daily bread.
The dew is nightly on thy hearth.
Yet something sweeter to thee
clings.
And some who enter think they hear
The murmur of departing wings.
No doubt within the chambers
thei'e,
Not by the wall nor through the
gate.
Uncounted tenants come, to Mliom
The house is not so desolate.
850
BIORDAN.
To them the walls are white and
warm,
The chimneys lure the laughing
flame,
The bride and groom take happy
hands,
The new-born babe awaits a name.
Who knows what far-off journeyers
At night return with winged
feet.
To cool their fever in the brook.
Or haunt the meadow, clover-
sweet ?
And yet the morning mowers find
Xo footprint in the grass they mow,
The water's clear, unwritten song
Is not of things that come or go.
" Tis not forsaken rooms alone
Tliat unseen people love to tread,
Nor in the moments only when
The day's eluded cares are dead.
To every home, or high or low.
Some unimagined guests repair,
Who come unseen to break and bless
The bread and oil they never share.
Roger Kiordan.
INVOCATION.
Come, come, come, my love, come and hurry, and come, my dear;
You'll find me ever loving true, or lying on my bier:
For love of you has buriiedine through — has oped a gap for Death, I fear ;
O come, come, come, my love, before his hand is here.
Though angels' swords should bar your way, turn you not back, but
persevere ;
Though heaven should send down fiery hail, rain lightnings, do not fear;
Let your small, exquisite, white feet fly over cliffs and mountains sheer,
Bridge rivers, scatter armed foes, shine on the hill-tops near.
Like citizens to greet their queen, then shall my hopes, desires, troop out,
Eager to meet you on your way and compass vou about —
To speed, to urge, to lift you on, 'mid storms of joy and floods of tears.
To the poor town, the battered wall, delivered by your spears.
The -javelin-scourges of your eye, the lightnings from your glorious face,
Shall drive away Death's armies gray in ruin and disgrace.
Lift me you shall, and succor me; iny ancient courage you shall rouse.
Till like a giant I shall stand, with thunder on my brows.
Then, hand in hand, we'll laugh at Death, his brainless skull, his nerveless
arm;
How can he wreak our overthrow, or plot, to do us harm ?
For what so Meak a thing as Death when you are near, when you are near ?
Oh, come, come, come, my love, before his hand is here !
lilTTEB — RUSSELL.
851
Mary L Ritter.
RECOMPENSE.
Heart of my heart! when that ijreat
light shall fall,
Burning away this veil of earthly
dust,
And I behold thee beautiful and
strong.
My grand, pure, perfect angel, wise
and just;
If the strong passions of my mortal
life
Should, in the vital essence, still re-
main,
Would there be then — as now —
some cruel bar
Whereon my tired hands should beat
in vain ?
Or should I, drawn and lifted, folded
close
In eager-asking arms, unlearn my
fears
And in one transport, ardent, wild
and sweet,
Keceive the promise of the endless
years ?
T. H. Robertson.
COQUETTE.
" Coquette," my love they some-
times call.
For she is light of lips and heart;
What though she smile alike on all,
If in her smiles she knows no art ?
Like some glad brook she seems to
be.
That ripples o'er its pebbly bed.
And prattles to each flower or tree.
Which stoops to kiss it, overhead.
Beneath the heavens' white and blue
It purls and sings and laughs and
leaps.
The sxinny meadows dancing through
O'er noisy shoals and frothy steeps.
'Tis thus the world doth see the
brook ;
But I have seen it otherwise.
When following it to some far nook
Where leafy shields shut out the
skies.
And there its waters rest, subdued.
In shadowy pools, serene and shy,
Wherein grave thoughts and fancies
brood
And tender dreams and longings
lie. " ^
I love it when it laughs and leaps,
But love it better when at rest —
'Tis only in its tranquil deeps
I see my image in its breast !
AN IDLE POET.
'Tis said that when the nightingale
His mate has found.
He fills no more the woodland deeps
With songful sound.
I sing not since I found my love.
For, like tlie bird's
My heart is full of song too sweet,
Too deep, for words.
Irwin Russell.
HER CONQUEST.
Muster thy wit, and talk of Avhatso-
ever
Light, mirth-provoking matter
thou canst find :
I laugh, and own that thou, with
small endeavor.
Hast won my miud.
Be silent if thou wilt — thine eyes ex-
pressing
Thy thoughts and feelings, lift
tliem up to mine:
Then quickly thou shalt hear me,
love, confessing
My heart is thine.
852
SAXTON— 8 HURTLE FF.
And let that brilliant glance become
but tender —
Return me heart for heart — then
take the whole
< )f all that yet is left me to surrender:
Thou hast my soul.
Now, when the three are fast in thy
possession,
And thou hast paid me back their
worth, and more,
I'll tell thee — all whereof I've made
thee cession
Was thine before.
Andrew B. Saxton,
MIDSUMMER.
MiDAVAY about the circle of the year
There is a single perfect day that lies
Supremely fair before our careless
eyes;
After the spathes of floral bloom ap-
pear,
Before is found the first dead leaf and
sere.
It comes precursor of the autumn
skies.
And crown of spring's endeavor.
Till it dies
We do not dream the flawless day is
here.
And thus, as on the way of life Ave
speed,
Mindful but of the joys we hope to
see.
We never think. "These present
hours exceed
All that has been or that shall ever
be;"
Yet somewhere on our journey we
shall stay
Backward to gaze on our midsummer
day.
DELA r.
Thou dear, misunderstood, maligned
Delay,
What gentler hand than thine can
any know !
How dost thou soften Death's un-
kindly blow.
And halt his messenger upon the way !
How dost thou unto Shame's swift
herald say,
" Linger a little with thy weight of
woe! "
How art thou, imto those whose
joys o'erflow,
A stern highwayman, bidding passion
stay,
Robbing the lover's imlses of their
heat
Within the lonesome shelter of thy
wood !
Of all Life's varied accidents we meet
Where can we find so great an- of-
fered good ?
Even the longed-for heaven might
seem less sweet
Could we but hurry to it when we
would.
Ernest W. Shurtleff.
OUT OF THE DARK.
Day like a flower blossoms from the
night.
And all things beautiful arise from
things
That bear a lesser grace. The lily
springs
Pure as an angel's soul, and just as
white.
From out the dark clod where no ray
of light
E'er creeps. The butterfly, on airy
wings,
Rises from the cold chrysalis that
clings
To some dead, mouldering leaflet, hid
from sight.
If thus in nature all things good and
fair.
And all things that the grace of beauty
wear,
Begotten are of things that hold no
charm,
Then will I seek to find in eveiy care,
And every sorrow, and in all the harm
That comes to me, a pleasure swee'
and rare.
SPALDING — THOMPSON.
853
Susan Mark Spalding.
A DESIRE.
Let me not lay the lightest feather's
weight
Of duty upon love. Let not, my
own,
The breath of one reluctant kiss be
blown
Between our hearts. I would not be
the gate
That bars, like some inexorable
fate.
The portals of thy life; that says,
" Alone
Through me shall any joy to thee be
known!"
Eather the window, fragrant early
and late
With thy sweet, clinging thoughts,
that grow and twine
Around me like some bright and
blooming vine.
Through which the sun shall shed his
wealth on thee
In golden showers ; through which
thou mayest look out
Exulting in all beauty, without
doubt.
Or fear, or shadow of regret from me.
Edith M, Thomas.
FLOWER AND FRUIT.
In the spring, perverse and sour,
He cared not for bud or flower,
Garden row or blossomed tree:
Rounded fruit he fain would see;
Vintage glow on sunburnt hills,
Bursting garners, toiling mills.
Sheer unreason!
Pity 'twere to waste the blooming
season !
AVhat's the matter ? Xow he sits
Deep in thought; his brow he knits
Here is fruit on vine and bough, —
Malcontent ! what seeks he now ?
Would have flowers when flowers
are none,
So in love with springtime grown!
Sheer unreason !
Pity 'twere to waste the rii>ened sea-
son!
Maurice Thompson.
THE MORNING HILLS.
He sits among the morning hills,
His face is bright and strong;
He scans far heights, but scarcely
notes
The herdsman's idle song.
He cannot brook this peaceful life.
While battle's trumpet calls;
He sees a crown for him who wins,
A tear for him who falls.
The flowery glens and shady slopes
Are hateful to his eyes;
Beyond the heights, beyond the
storms.
The land of promise lies.
He is so old and sits so still.
With face so weak and mild.
We know that he remembers naught,
Save when he was a child.
His fight is fought, his fame is won,
liife's highest peak is past.
The laurel crown, the triumph's arch
Are worthless at the last.
The frosts of age destroy the bay, —
The loud applause of men
Falls feebly on the palsied ears
Of fourscore years and ten.
He does not hear the voice that bears
His name around the world ;
He has no thought of great deeds done
Where battle-tempests whirled.
But evermore he's looking back,
Whilst memory fills and thrills
With echoes of the herdsman's song
Among the morning hills.
854
TICKNOR.
BEFORE DAWN.
A KEEN, insistent hint of dawn
('anie from the mountain height;
A wan, uncertain gleam betrayed
The faltering of the night.
The emphasis of silence made
The fog above the brook
Intensely pale ; the trees took on
A haunted, haggard look.
Such quiet came, expectancy
Filled all the earth and sky ;
Time seemed to pause a little space;
I heard a dream go by !
Frank 0, Ticknor.
LITTLE GIFFEX.
Out of the focal and foremost fire.
Out of the hospital walls as dire ;
Smitten of grape-shot and gangrene,
(Eighteenth battle, and he sixteen!)
Spectre! sucli as you seldom see.
Little Giffen, of Tennessee !
" Take him and welcome!" the sui--
geons said ;
Little the doctor can help the dead !
So we took him; and brought him
where
The balm was sweet in the summer
air;
And we laid him down on a whole-
some bed —
Utter Lazarus, heel to head!
And we watclied the war with abated
breath, —
Skeleton boy against skeleton death.
Months of torture, how many such ?
Weary weeks of the stick and crutch;
And still a glint of the steel-blue eye
Told of a spirit tliat wouldn't die,
And didn't. Nay, more! in death's
despite
The crippled skeleton " learned to
write."
Dear mot her, at first, of course; and
then
Dear captain, intjuiring about, the
men.
Captain's answer: of eighty-and-five,
Giffen and I are left alive.
Word of gloom from the war, one day ;
Johnson pressed at the front, they say.
Little Giffen was up and a^ay ;
A tear — his first — as he bade good-by,
Dimmed the glint of his steel-blue eye,
"'I'll write, if spared!" There was
news of the fight ;
But none of Giffen. He did not write.
I sometimes fancy that, were I king
Of the princely knights of the golden
ring,
With the song of the minstrel in mine
ear,
And the tender legend that trembles
here,
I'd give the best on his bended knee,
The whitest soul of my chivalry,
For " Little Giffen," of Tennessee.
GBA Y.
Something so human-hearted
In a tint that ever lies
Where a splendor has just departed
And a glory is yet to rise!
Gray in the solemn gloaming,
Gray in the dawning skies ;
In the old man's crown of honor.
In the little maiden's eyes.
Gray mists o'er the meadows brood-
ing,
Whence the ^\orld must draw its
best ;
Gray gleams in the churchyard
shadows,
Where all the world would " rest."
Gray gloom in the grand cathedral,
Where the " Glorias" are poured.
And, with angel and archangel,
We wait the coming Lord.
Silvery gray for the bridal.
Leaden gray for the pall ;
For urn, for wreath, for life and death.
Ever the (rrai/ for all.
Gray in the very sadness
Of ashes and sackcloth ; yea,
While our raiment of beauty and
gladness
Tarries, our tear^ shall stay;
And our soul shall smile through
their sadness,
And our hearts shall wear the Gray.
Henry Timrod.
HARK TO THE SHOUTING WIND!
Hark to the shouting wind!
Hark to the flying rain !
And I care not though I never see
A bright blue sky again. •
There are thoughts in my breast to-
day
That are not for human speech ;
But I hear them in the driving storm.
And the roar upon the beach.
And oh ! to be with that ship
That I watch through the blinding
brine !
wind ! for thy sweep of land and
sea!
O sea! for a voice like thine!
Shout on, thou pitiless wind.
To the frightened and flying rain !
1 care not though I never see
A calm blue sky again.
Meanwhile, behalf the tardy years
Which keep in trust your storied
tombs.
Behold ! your sisters bring their
tears,
And these memorial blooms.
Small tributes ! but your shades will
smile
More proudly on those wreaths to-
day.
Than when some cannon-moulded
pile
Shall overlook this bay.
Stoop, angels, hither from the skies!
There is no holier spot of ground
Than where defeated valor lies.
By mourning beauty crowned.
DECORATION ODE.
Sung at Magnolia Cemetery, Charleston,
S. C. 1867.
Sleep sweetly in your humble
graves,
Sleep, martyrs of a fallen cause ;
Though yet no marble column craves
The pilgrim here to pause.
In seeds of laurel in the earth
The blossom of yom- fame is
blown.
And somewhere waiting for its birth,
The shaft is in the stone.
A COMMON THOUGHT.
Somewhere on this earthly planet,
In the dust of flowers to be.
In the dew-drop, in the sunshine,
Sleeps a solemn day for me.
At this wakeful hour of midnight
I behold it dawn in mist.
And I hear a sound of sobbing
Through the darkness. Hist, oh,
hist!
In a dim and nmsky chamber,
I am breathing life away!
Some one draws a curtain softly.
And I watch the broadening day.
As it purples in the zenith.
As it brightens on the lawn.
There's a hush of death about me.
And a whisper, '' He is gone!"
Isaac Watts.
INSIGNIFICA N T EX IS TENCE.
There are a number of us creep
Into this world, to eat and sleep;
And know no reason why we're born,
But only to consume the corn,
856
WELBF— WHITMAN.
Devour the cattle, fowl, and fish,
And leave behind an empty dish.
The crows and ravens do the same,
Unlucky birds of hateful name;
Kavens oi- crows might fill tlieir
places,
And swallow corn and carcases.
Then if their tombstone, when they
die,
Be n't taugiit to flatter and to lie.
There's nothing better will be said
Than that "they've eat up all their
bread,
Drunlc up their drink, and gone to
bed."
LOBD, WHEN I QUIT THIS
EARTHLY STAGE.
Lord, wlien I quit tliis eartlily
stage,
Where shall I flee but to thy breast?
For I have sought no other home.
For I have learned no other rest.
I cannot live contented here,
Without some glimpses of thy face;
And heaven, without thy presence
there.
Would be a dark and tiresome
place.
My God! Andean a humble child.
That loves thee with a flame so
high.
Be ever from thy face exiled,
Witliout the pity of thy eye ?
Impossible. For thine own hands
Have tied my heart so fast to tliee.
And in thy book tlie promise stands.
That where thou art thy friends
must be.
THE HEAVENLY CANAAN.
There is a land of pure delight.
Where saints immortal reign ;
Eternal day excludes tlie night,
And pleasures banish pain.
There everlasting spring abides,
And never-fading flowers ;
Death, like a narrow sea divides
This heavenly land fi'om ours.
Sweet fields, beyond the swelling
flood.
Stand dressed in living green :
So to the JeAvs fair Canaan stood,
Wliile Jordan rolled between.
But timorous mortals start and
shrink.
To cross this narrow sea;
And linger, trembling, on the brink.
And fear to launch away.
Oh, could we make our doubts re-
move.
Those gloomy doubts that rise,
And see the Canaan tliat we love
With unbeclouded eyes ; —
Could we but climb where Moses
stood.
And view the landscape o'er.
Not Jordan's stream — nor death's
cold flood.
Should friglit us from the shore.
Amelia B. Welby.
TWILIGHT AT SEA.
The twilight hours, like birds, flew
by,
As lightly and as free ;
Ten thousand stars were in the sky,
Ten thousand on tlie sea.
For every wave witli dhnpled face
That leaped upon the air,
Had caught a star in its embrace
And held it trembling there.
Sarah H, Whitman.
SONNETS TO EDGAR ALLAN POE.
When first I looked into thy glorious
eyes,
And saw, with their unearthly beauty
pained,
WHITMAN.
Heaven deepening within heaven,
like the skies
Of autumn nights without a shadow
stained, —
I stood as one whom some strange
dream entliralls:
For, far away, in some lost life
divine.
Some land which every glorious
dream recalls,
A spirit looked on me with eyes like
thine.
E'en now, though death has veiled
their starry light.
And closed their lids in his relentless
night —
As some strange dream, remembered
in a dream.
Again I see in sleep their tender
beam ;
Unfading hopes their cloudless azure
fill.
Heaven deepening within heaven,
sei'ene and still.
If thy sad heart, pining for human
love,
In its earth solitude grew dark with
fear.
Lest the high sun of heaven itseif
should prove
Powerless to save from that phantas-
mal sphere
Wherein thy spirit wandered — if the
flowers
That pressed around thy feet seemed
but to bloom
In lone Gethseinanes, through star-
less hours,
When all who loved had left thee to
thy doom ! —
Oh, yet believe that in that hollow
vale
Where thy soul lingers, waiting to at-
tain
So much of Heaven's sweet grace as
shall avail
To lift its burden of remorseful
pain, —
My soul shall meet thee, and its
heaven forego
Till God's great love on both, one
hope, one Heaven, bestow.
THE LAST FLOWERS.
Dost thou remember that autumnal
day
When by the Seekonk's lovely
wave we stood.
And marked the languor of repose
that lay.
Softer than sleep, on valley, wave,
and wood?
A trance of holy sadness seemed to
lull
The charmed earth and circinn-
ambient air;
And the low murmur of the leaves
seemed full
Of a resigned and passionless des-
pair.
Though the warm breath of sunuuer
lingered still
In the lone paths where late her
footsteps passed.
The pallid star-llowers on the pur]>le
hill
Sighed dreamily, " We are the last
— the last!"
I stood beside thee, and a dream of
heaven
Around me like a golden halo fell!
Then the bright veil of fantasy was
riven,
And my lips nmrmured, "Fare
thee well! farewell!"
I dared not listen to thy words, nor
tiu'n
To meet the mystic language of
thine eyes;
I only felt their power, and in the
urn
Of memory, treasured their sweet
rhapsodies.
We parted then, forever — and the
hours
Of that bright day were gathered to
the past —
But through long, wintry nights I
heard the flowers
Sigh dreamily, " AVe are the last!
— the last! "
858
YOUNO.
William Young.
THE HORSEMAN.
Who is it rides with whip and spur —
Or madman, oi" king's messenger?
The night is near, the lights begin
To glimmer from the roadside inn.
And o'er the moorland, waste and
wide,
The mists behind the horseman ride.
" Ho, there within — a stirrup-cup!
No time have I to sleep or sup.
" An honest cup! — and mingle well
The juices that have stiU the" spell
"To banish doubt and care, and
slay
The ghosts that prowl the king's
highway."
"And whither dost thou ride, my
friend ?"
"My friend, to find tlie roadway's
end. ' '
His eyeballs shone: he caught and
quaffed.
With scornful lips, the burning
draught.
" Yea, friend, I ride to prove my
life;
If there be guerdon worth the strife —
" If after loss, and after gain.
And after bliss, and after pain,
" There be no deeper draught than
this —
No sharper pain — no sweeter bliss —
" Nor anything which yet I crave
This side, or yet beyond the grave —
'' All this, all this I ride to know;
So pledge me, gray-beard, ere I go.''
"But gold thou hast: and youth is
thine.
And on thy breast the blazoned sign
"Of honor — yea, and Love hath
bound.
With rose and leaf thy temples round.
"With youth, and name, and wealth
in store.
And woman's love, what wilt thou
more? "
" * What more ? ' ' what more ? ' thou
gray-beard wight?
That something yet — that one de-
light—
"To know! to know! — although it
be
To know but endless misery!
" The something that doth beckon
still,
Beyond the plain, beyond the hill,
" Beyond the moon, beyond the sun,
Where yonder shining coursers run.
"Farewell! Where'er the pathway
trend,
1 ride, I ride, to fuid the end! "
INDEX TO FIEST LTOES
A bee flew in at my window, Kimball, 319
Abide not in the land of dreams, Burleigh, 809
Abide with me ! fast falls the eventide Lyfe, 353
A bird sang sweet and strong Curtis, 181
A blue-eyed child that sits amid the noon, Bennett, 37
Abou Ben Adhem (may his tribe increase) Hunt 299
A brace of sinners, for no good Wolcot, 792
A certain artist — I've forgot his name — Btjrom, 706
A chieftain, to the Highlands bound, Campbell Ill
A clergyman who longed to trace, J^- Bates, 687
irHson, 657
Thaxter 591
E. D. Proctor, ... 449
Palmer 762
40
84
677
437
792
207
A cloud lay cradled near the .setting sun,
Across the narrow beach we flit.
Across the steppe we journeyed,
A district school, not far away, .
Advancing Spring profusely spreads abroad, .... Bloomfield
Ae fond kiss, and then we sever Burns. .
A face that should content me wondrous well Wi/att, .
Afar in the desert I love to ri47
A lily rooted in a sacred soil, /'Iu'ljis, 410
A little child, beneath a tree MacL-itij 361
A little hand, a fair soft hand, Spofford, ...... 5.'j0
All are not taken ! they are left behind, E.'ji. Broirnhif/, . . 03
All beautiful things bring sadness, Trench, ...... 603
All clianiii- ; no death, E. Yotiiuj, 683
All con(iu»st-liushed, from prostrate Python, came, . . Thomson r)!).5
All day 1 heard a humming in my ears Boler, 4.")
Scott, 4S(t
G. Arnold, 23
E. Young 677
.3.5
(ill
All joy was bereft me the ilay that you left me
All moveless stand the ancient cedar trees
All promise is poor dilatory man, . . .
" All quiet along the Potomac," they say Beers,
All round the lalce the wet woods shake, Trou'brkhje,
All the kisses that 1 have given C. F. Bates, .... .31
" All the rivers run into the sea," Phelps, 4l()
All the world's a stage, Shakespeare, .... 4X4
All tilings have a doulilc power R. Southey, .... ."Jlti
All tilings once arc things for ever ; Lord Houqhfon, . . . 28!)
All Ihouglits, all passidiis, all delights S. T. Voler'tdije, . . . 141
All winter drives along the darkened air, Thomson, . . . . . 593
All worldly shapes shall melt ill gloom, Campbell, 109
Almighty Father ! let thy lowly child, E. Elliott, 212
Almost at the root, . . . . " Wordsworth, .... 669
Alone 1 walked the ocean strand, Gould, 238
A lovely sky, a cloudless sun, Street .548
Although 1 enter not, Thach-rm/ .'jss
A man's life is a tower, Tupjirr, (;20
A man so various that he seemed to be, Drijden, 722
A man there came, whence none could tell, Allingham, .... Is
Amid the elms that interlace Crunch, 174
A moiiarcli soul hath ruled thyself, O Queen, . . . . C. E. Bates, .... 31
Among so many, can He care? Whitney, 638
And are ye sure the news is true? Mickle 372
And greedy Avarice by him did ride, E. Sjienser, .... .525
And if my voice break forth, 'tis not that now, .... Byron, 103
And is there care in heaven ? E. Spenser, .... .528
And is the swallow gone? W. Hoioitt, .... 2!it;
And ne'er did Grecian chisel trace, Scott, 477
And now arriving at the Hall, he tried, Crabbe 719
And now, unveiled, the toilet stands displayed, . . . Pope, 767
And now, while winged with ruin from on high, . . . Falconer, 217
And oh, the longing, burning eye ! Leiand, 339
And such is Human Life ; so, gliding on, liogers, 462
And thou hast stolen a jewel. Death Masse;/ .368
And thou hast walked about, H. Smith, 511
And was it not enough that, meekly growing, .... Se.aver, 482
And were that best. Love, dreamless, endless sleep?. . Gilder, 233
And yet how lovely in thine age of woe Byron li)5
Angels are we, that, once from heaven exiled, .... Trench 606
Anon tired laborers bless their sheltering home, . . . Bloomlield, .... 4(t
An original something, fair maid Campbell, 708
Answer me, burning stars of night ! Hemans 261
A poet ! He hath put his heart to school, Wordsujorth, .... <)74
A power hid in pathos ; a lire veiled in cloud : .... I!. B. Lyttnn S41
April is in ; Symonils, .5,59
Are these the pompous tidings ye proclaim, Campbell, 117
Around, around, flew each sweet sound, S. T. Coleridr/e, . . . 135
Arrived at home, how then they gazed around, . . . . Crabbe, ..'.... 165
A sad old house by the sea, //.//. Brownell. ... .58
As a fond mother, when the day is o'er, //. W. Lonr/fellow, . . .34»
As doctors give physic by way of prevention Prior, .'.".... 772
As dyed in blood, the streaming vines appear, .... C.F.Bates, .... 31
A sensitive plant in a garden grew, Shelley, 493
A sentence hath formed a character Tupper, 619
A sentinel angel sitting high in glory, Ha'.l, -'54
A serener blue ' Tli'omson, 592
As 1 came round the harbor buoy /nqelow, 307
A simple child, Wordsworth, .... 673
INDEX TO FIRST LINES.
861
A simple, sodded mound of earth, J'reston, 435
As I was sitting in a wood, Mackay 757
Ask me no more ; the moon may draw the sea, .... Tennyson 578
Ask me no moi-e where Jove bestows, ....... Careir, 118
Ask me why 1 send you here HerricI:, . . .
A slanting ray of evening light, J. Taylor, . .
As leaves turned red, i^. Batcn, . .
As light November snows to empty nests, £. B. Broivn'mg,
As lords their laborers' hire delay, Scott
A soldier of the Legion lay dying in .\lgiers C. E. S. Norton,
A sower went forth to sow,
u'66
572
32
67
479
397
GihJer 231
As precious gums are not for lasting fire, JOryden, 2(16
As ships, becalmed at eve, that lay, Clough, 131
As slow our ship her foaming track, Moore, 388
As sweet as the breath that goes, T. B. Alilrich, ... 10
As sweet desire of day before the day, Sivinhurne, .... 552
A steed, a steed of matchless speed ! Moiherirell, .... 392
A street there is in Paris famous, Thackeray, .... 782
As thoughts possess the fashion of the mood, .... Abbey 2
As through the land at eve we went, Tennyson .577
A story of Ponce de Leon, Buttericorth, .... sn
A summer mist on the moimtain heights, Webster 631
As virtuous men pass mildly away, Donne, 818
As when a little child returned from play, Miller, 373
As when in watches of the night we see, Appleton, 19
As woodbine weds the plants, Cou'per 161
At dawn the fleet stretched miles away, J. T. Fields, .... 225
At dawn when the jubilant morning broke, J. C. li. Dorr, . . . 196
A thing of beauty is a joy forever, Keats, 312
A thousand daily sects rise up and die Dry den 205
A thousand years shall come and go R. T. Cooke, .... 1.52
At kirk knelt Valborg, the cold altar-stone, G. Jlovyhton, .... 284
At midnight in his guarded tent, Halleck, ...... 248
At our creation, but the word was said ; Quarles, .' . . . . 4.51
A traveller across the desert waste, Abbey, 1
At summer eve, when Heaven's ethereal bow, .... Campbell, 115
Autobiography ! so you say, Havergal, 823
Avoid extremes ; and shun the fault of such, .... Pope, 432
A weary weed, tossed to and fro, Fenner 222
A wet sheet and a flowing sea, Cnnninyliam, . . . . 180
A wife, as tender, and as true withal, Dry den, 206
Ay, scatter me well, 'tis a moist spring day, E. Cook, 149
Ay, but to die, and go we know not where", Shakespeare, .... 487
Backward, turn backward, O Time, in your flight, . .
Bards of passion and of mirth,
Beautiful Evelyn Hope is dead !
Becalmed along the azure sky,
Because I feel that, in the heavens above,
Because I hold it sinful to despond,
Because in a day of my days to come,
Because 1 wear the swaddling bands of time, ....
Because love's sigh is but a sigh,
Before I trust my fate to thee,
Behold her there in the evening sun,
Behold the rocky wall,
Believe not that your inner eye,
Ben Battle was a soldier bold,
Bending between me and the taper,
Beneath the hill you may see the mill
Beneath yon tree, observe an ancient pair,
Benighted in my pilgrimage, — alone, —
Be patient ! oh, be patient ! Put your ear against the earth.
Beside me, — in the car, — .^she sat
Beside yon strnggling fence that skirts the way, . . .
Be thoii familiar, hut by no means vulgar, .'. . . .
Better trust all and be deceived,
Beyond the smiling and the weeping,
Bird of the wilderness,
Allen 15
Keals, 311
li. Broirninr/ 69
Troicbridge 609
Poe, 425
Thaxter, 589
Sanqster, 468
5. fl. Palfrey, ... 847
Winter, 660
A. A. Procter, ... 442
Larcom, 330
Holmes, 279
Lord Houghton. . . . 287
Hood, .' 7.39
A. T. De Fere. . . . 185
Saxe, 474
Crabbe, 168
Tilton 602
Trench, 604
Clovf/h 132
Goldsmith, .... 235
Shakespeare, .... 485
Kemble 318
Bonar, 48
Hofju, ...... 271
Black boughs against a pale, clear sky,
Black Tragedy let slip her grim disguise
Blame not the times in which we live,
Blessed is he who hath not trod the ways,
Blessings on thee, little man, . . . ....
Blesseil is the man whose heart and hands are pure !
Blow, blow, thou winter wind,
Blow, northern winds !
Bonnie Tililiif Iiiglis, . . . . . ....
Bowed half Willi aL;i' and half with reverence, . . .
Brave spirit, that will brook no intervention, . . .
Break, break, break,
Breathes there the man, with soul so dead, ....
Briglit as the pillar rose at Heaven's command, . .
Bright books ! the perspectives to our weak sights, .
Bright shadows of true rest ! some shoots of bliss,
Bright Star ! would 1 were steadfast as thou art, . .
Bring poppies for a weary mind,
Brown bird, with a \\is2) in your mouth
Burly, dozing humble-bee,
" But a week is so long ! " he said,
But grant, the virtues of a temperate prime, ....
But happy they ! the happiest of their kind ! ...
But list ! a low and moaning sound,
But not e'en pleasure to excess is good
But now the games succeeded, then a pause, ....
But what strange art, what magic can dispose, . . .
But who the melodies of inoru can tell ?
By Nebo's lonely mountain,
By numbers here from shame or censure free, . . .
By the flow of the inland river
By the motes do we know where the sunbeam is slanting
By the pleasant paths we know, = .
By the rude bridge that arched the flood,
By these mysterious ties, the busy power,
By the wayside, on a mossy stone,
Calm me, my God, and keep me calm,
Calm on the bosom of our God,
Care lives with all ; no rules, no precepts save, . . .
Centre of light and energy ! thy way,
Charlemagne, the mighty monarch,
Cheap, mighty art ! her art of love,
Children, that lay their pretty garlands by, ....
" Choose thou between ! " and to his enemy, . . .
Christ, whose glory Alls the skies
Clear, placid Leman ! thy contrasted lake
Cleon hath ten thousand acres,
Close his eyes ; his work is done !
Cold in the earth — and the deep snow,
Cold is the piean honor sings,
Come a little nearer, doctor, —
Come, brother, turn with me from pining thought, .
Come, come, come, my love, come and hiu'ry, . . .
Come, Disappointment, come !
Come into the garden, Maud
Come, let us anew our journey pursue,
Come, listen all unto my song,
Come live with me and be my love,
Come not when I am dead,
Come, sleep, O sleep, the certain knot of peace, . .
Comes something down with evt^ntide,
Come, then, rare politicians of the time,
Come, then, tell me, sage divine,
Come, ye disconsolate, where'er ye languish, . . .
Companion dear ! the hour draws nigh ;
Contide ye aye in Providence, for Providence is kind,
Consider the sea's listless chime ;
" Coquette," my love they sometimes call, ....
Lazarus, oi>7
T. B. Aldrich, ... lli
Symonds, .55!)
A. T. De Vere, ... 186
Whittier, 63!)
Sjimonds, 558
Shakcspciiri' 484
Hopkins 828
M. J/dirit/ 2!)5
A. Fh-Uh, 2l'4
Richdrdson, .... 458
Tennyson, 584
Hcott, 478
Campbe/l, 11(>
]'au()lian, 62f>
Vaug/ian, 024
Keats, 311
Winter, 658
Braddock, 805
Emerson, 214
J. C. Ji. Dorr, . . . 195
S. Johnson, .... 3U8
Thomson 5!)1
If'ilson, 657
Thomson, 596
A. Fields, ..... 223
Crahbe, 170
Seattle, 34
Alexander, .... 12
S. Johnsoi], .... .109
Finch, 227
M. M. Dodye, . . . 192
Prescott, 433
Emerson, 215
Akenside, 5
Hoyt, 296
Bonar 48
Hemans 263
Crabbe, 169
Percival 411
W. A. Butler, ... 87
Vauqhan, 622
Craik 172
Bensel, 38
Wesley 632
Btfron, 101
3iackay 362
Boker 47
E. Bronte, .54
Winter, 001
Witlson, 655
Da7ia 182
Biordan, 850
H. K. White, .... 035
Tenni/son, 508
Wesley 633
Saxe 775
Marlowe 842
Tennyson 585
Sidnei/ 499
Burbidye 809
Vatcyhan, 623
Akenside, 4
Moore, 387
Sigournc'i/ 499
Ballanti/ne 28
V. G. Bossetti, ... 467
Uobertson 851
INDEX TO FIRST LINES.
863
Couched in the rocky lap of hills, Coolidge, 814
Could we but know, Sfedmau, 536
Could you come back to me, Douglas, Craik, 172
Count each affliction, whether light or grave, . . . A. T. DeWn-. . . . im
Crouch no more by the ivied walls, Stedman, 537
Crushing the scarlet strawberries in the grass Thaxter, 589
/ Darkness before, all joy behind ! G. Jlouglilon, . . . . 285
Darlings of the forest Cooke, 152
Dashing in big drops on the narrow pane; Burlngh, 8U9
Daughter of Love ! Out of the flowing river A. Fields 223
Day dawned : — within a curtained room A. A. Procter, . . . 445
Day, in melting puri)le dying ; lirooKs, 55
Day, like a flower, blossoms from the night, Shu7-tleff, 852
Day-stars ! that ope your eyes with morn, H. Smitli, 510
Day will return with'a fresher boon ; lloUand, 272
Dead, lonely night, and all streets quiet now, .... Morrin 390
Dead? Thirteen a month ago, E. Ji. Ilrotrning, . . Gl
Dear child of nature, let them rail ! U'ordsirorth, .... G71
Dear Ellen, your tales are all plenteously stored, . . . ISlooinfield, .... 43
Dear friend, far otf, my lost desire Tennyson, .576
Dear friend, I know not if such days and nights, . . . Symonds, 560
Dear, harmless age ! the short, swift span, Vauc/han, 622
Dear, secret greenness ! nurst below ! Vawjlian, 621
Deatli but entombs the body ; ■ . . . . E. Young, 681
Death is here, and death is there Shelley, 492
Deep in the wave is a coral grove Percival, 413
Dey vented to the Opera Haus, Leland, 744
Didst thou ne'er see the swallow's veering breast, . . . Baillie, 27
Did you hear of the Widow Malone Lever, 745
Die down, O dismal day, and let me live ; D. Gray, 822
Dim as the borrowed beams of moon and stars, .... Dryden. 204
Discard soft nonsense in a slavish tongue, W. Collins, .... 145
Discourage not thyself, my soul, Wither, 663
Disdain me not without desert, Wyait, 677
Distrust that word E. n. liroieniny, . . 688
Do, and suffer naught in vain ; E. Elliott, 212
Does the road winil up-hill all the way ? C. G. liossetti. ... 464
Dost know the way to Paradise? Hutchinson, .... 830
Dost thou remember that autumnal day, Whitman, 857
Do the dead carry their cares, JI. H. Broicnell, ... 58
Doubtless the pleasure is as great, .S'. Butler, 701
Down by the river's bank I strayed, Lover, .'!47
Dow's Flat. That's its name, Bret Ilarte 727
Do you remember, my sweet, absent son G. P. Lathrop, . . . 334
Drink to me only Avitii thine eyes, Jonson, 309
Dubius is such a scrupulous good man, Coivper, 714
Earl March looked on his dying child, Campbell, 115
Earth gets its price for what earth gives us, Lnirell, 349
Earth has not anything to show more fair, Wordsivorth 673
Eftsoones unto an holy hospital, Spenser, 527
Erewhile the sap has had its will, Hopkins, 829
Eternal spirit of the chainless mind Byron, 93
Ethereal minstrel ! pilgrim of the sky, Wordsivorth 673
Even as a nurse, whose child's impatient pace, . . . . Vauyhan 626
Ever let the fancy roam ; Keats, 311
Every coin of earthly treasure Saxe, 476
Every wedding, says' the proverb, Parsons, 410
. . 2dG
. . 130
. . 258
. . 124
. . 92
. . 487
Fair as the dawn of the fairest day, Hayne
Fair is thy face, Nantasket, Clemmer
Fair time of calm resolve — of sober thought !
False and fickle, or fair and sweet,
Fare thee well ! and if for ever,
Farewell, a long farewell to all my greatness ! .
Farewell, Life ! my senses swim,
Farewell, old frieiid,— we part at last ; . . . .
Farewell, Renown ! Too fleeting flower, . . .
Hedderwick, . .
P. Carey, . . .
Byron
Shakespeare, . .
Hood 2S3
E. Cook, 150
Dobson, 190
864
INDEX TO FIRST LINES.
Farewell ! since nevermore for thee, Hervey 268
Farewell, thou busy world, antl may Cotton 154
Father, 1 will not ask for wealth or fame J'arker, 406
Father of all ! in every age, Pope, 4:B
Fear ileath ? — to feel the fog in my throat 1\. Brovning, ... 68
?^ear no more the heat o' the sun, Shakespeare, .... 488
Fever and fret and aimless stir, Fnher, 217
Few know of life's beginnings — men behold— .... Laiidon 326
First follow Nature, and your judgment frame, . . . Pope, 4:52
First, from each brother's hoard a part they draw, . . Crubhe, 717
First time he kissed me, he but only kissed, K. B. Broiniiiu/, . . 64
Fixed to her necklace, like another gem, T. B. Aldrich, ... 12
Flutes in the sunny air ! Hervey, 267
Fly, envious Time, till thou run out thy race, .... Milton 374
Fly fro' the press, and dwell with soothfastnesse, . . . Chmirer, 811
Foes to our race ! if ever ye have known, Cnibhe 168
Foiled by our fellow-men, depressed, outworn M. Arnokl 24
" Forever with the Lord ! " Montgomery, .... ."85
For every sin that comes before the light, J. B. (T Ueilly, . . . 401
" Forget me not." Ah, words of useless warning, . . . Sargent, 469
For him who must see many years, M. Arnold, .... 25
For Love I labored all the day Bnuiditlon, .... 50
For mystery is man's life Tupper, 620
Forthwith this frame of mine was wrenched, .... S. T. Coleridge, . . . 125
For us the almond tree, Tilton, 598
For woman is not undeveloped man, Tennyson, 578
Four straight brick Avails, severely plain Mitchell, 844
Frank-hearted hostess of the field and wood, .... Loirell, 3.51
Friend after friend departs ; Montgomery, .... .jSl
Friendship, like love is but a name, oliticiaus look for facts alone, Crahhe, 717
INDEX TO FIRST LINES.
865
Green be the turf above thee Hailed:
Green little vaulter" in the sunny grass, ] Hunt '. !
Hail, beauteous stranger of the grove ! Lor/an
Hail, free, clear heavens ! above our heads again, . . . Lazarus'
Hail, holy Liglit, offspring of Heaven tirst-born, . . . Mikoii '
Hail ! Independence, hail ! Heaven's next best gift, . . Thomson
Hail to thee, blithe spirit, Sliellci/ '
Hail, Twilight, sovereign of one peaceful hour, ". '. '. '. morris worth
Mad unambitious mortals minded nought, Thomson '
Half a league, half a league, ' ' Teuni/wn
Hamelin town's in Brunswick '. [ n. Biowidm,
Hand m hand with angels, Larcom
Happy are they who kiss thee, morn and even, ." .' .' .' A. T He Vere
2r,l
300
341
336
381
594
490
072
r>!»c
r.s4
Ci)0
332
1.S",
Prior, . . . 4-j9
Street, ...'..'. r,4!)
Cmrper, joi
. 83;»
Ha!)i>y the mortal man. who now at last, ....
Hark, that sweet carol ! Witli delight
Hark ! 'tis the twanging horn ! o'er yonder bridge
Hark to the measured march ! — The Saxons come, . . £. li. Liitton
Hark to tlie shouting wind ! Timrod ' ' '
Hark ! where the sweeping scythe now rips along,' '. ' Bloomiie'ld '
llast thou a charm to stay tlie morning star ,S'. T 'ColerUh/p '
Hast thou named all the birds without a gun? . . . . Emerson, . .' ' ' ' -m
Hath this world without me wrought Hedge, .....'. 2.59
"oh
41
13,S
Have mind that age aye follows youth, .... Dunbar
Have you not heard the iMiets tell ' " tB il'drirh' ' '
Hearing sweet music, as in fell despite, Treiicli ' ■ ■
Hear the sledges with the bells— .... /v,^ '
60.'-)
424
Hear the sledges with the bells— ^„p ,.,,
Heart of my heart ! when that great light shall fall, '. Hitter sr.f
Heaits, like api)les, are hard and sour, . ...
Heaven weeps above the earth all night till morn
He erred, no doubt, perhaps he sinned : . . .
286
Ho/land, 237
Tennyson, 585
He falters on the th^sl^oidrrrTr-. ! ! ! ' " " Howelif'°'' 'it
He had played for his lordship's levee, .' Dobson ' url
He is the freeman whom the truth makes free Coivner i^t^
He knew the seat of Paradise, v liifLr Ift,
Hence, loathed Melancholy, . . . . . Milton •^--
Hence to the altar, and with her thou lov'st, . . . .' Boaers' diii
Hence vain deluding joys, '....: S,!; ! ! .' : ' * t%
Here I come creeping, creeping everywhere, Boberts
Here IS the water-shed of all the year, B
Here she lies, a pretty bud, .......
Here, too, came one who bartered all for power'
Her hands are cold, her face is white ; . . .
Herr Schnitzer make a philosopede, ....''
Her suttering endeil with the day : .
He saw in sight of his house,
He sins against this life who slights the next.'
He sits among "
He taught
He that lov^„ ,. .„..j ..ucciv /.,
He took the suttering human 'race,' '.'.'.'..''' Af'^^JrnJ,! Hf
He touched his harp, and nations heard, ....'' Polloh a~:1
He was a man of that unsleeping spirit, " SirH'ranlor ' ' ■ ^~^
He was a man whom danger could not daunt, . . . sir A he Vere
4.'')9
U. Johnson, . . . 834
Herrick, '^66
Mitchell, 370
Holmes, 278
Leiand, 745
J. Aldrich, 8
Stoddard, 780
E. Yonnci 681
long the morning hills" ; ' Thorn Z TA
the cheerfulness that still is ours mZ^ard; ! ' ' ' 80'
ves a rosy cheek Carew '11s
le suttering human race, j\/ Ar'noi
d his harp, and nations heard Polio]-
nan of that unsleeping spirit, .... ' SirH.'Ti
^ nan whom danger could not daunt, . . . '. Sir A Th
He was m logic a great critic c r,/,/^,.
He, while his troop light-hearted leap ami play, . .' ' Crahbe
He who died at Azan sends. ... h ,"tw.
He who hath bent him o'er the (lead, .... ' ' Bnn
Higher, higher will we climb, .... • ■ • j^jn
High walls and huge the bodvmav confine, '.'.''
Hints, shrewdly strown, mightily disturb the spirit .
His love hath tilled my life's fair cup, ...
Hither, Sleep ! a mother wants thee ! . .
Home they brought her warrior dead, ...::.'. jennnson r,-jr
Honor and shame from no cmidition rise, . . . . Pone a-I
Hoot, ye little rascal! ye come it on me this way, . '. ' Carlet'on 7no
How are songs begot and bred? .', siodd ril -ui
How beautiful is night ! . . yoiieiatd 541
r>6'j
184
()!I9
164
21
Montrjomer;/ .';84
Garrison. ' 229
Tnpper. 017
M. A. iJe Vere. ... 817
Holland, ..... 274
Tennyson 577
Southey,
541
516
866
INDEX TO FIRST LINES.
How better am I
How blest should we be, have I often conceived, . . .
How canst thou call my modest love impure
How dear to this heart are the scenes of my childhood.
How delicious is the winning,
How does the water, . . .
How do 1 love thee ? Let me count the ways
How gracious we are to grant to the dead
How happy is he born and taught
How hard, when those wlio ilo not wish to lend, . . .
How, how am I deceived ! I thought my bed, . . . .
How looks Applcdore in a storm?
" How many pinuids does the baby weigh—
How many suuuners, love,
How miserable a thing is a great man !
How much the heart may bear, and yet not break ! . .
How near we came the hand of death,
How oft in visions of the night,
How one can live on beauty and be rich,
How pleasant it is that always
How pure at heart ami sound in head,
How seldom, friend ! a good great man inherits, . . .
How shall I know thee in tlie sphere which keeps, . .
How sleep the brave, who sink to rest
How soon hath Time, the sid)lle thief of youth, . . .
How still the morning of tlie hallowed day !
How sweet and gracious, even in common speech, . .
How vice and virtue in the soul contend ;
Ho ! ye who in the noble work,
Humanity is great ;
Husband and wife ! no converse now ye hold
Hush! speak low ; tread softly ;
Hush! 'tis a holy hour, — the quiet room,
I am an idle reed :
I am but clay in thy hands, but Thou
I am content, I do not care,
I am dying. Egypt, dying •
I'm far frae my hame, and I'u) weary aftenwhiles : .
I am Heiihaistos, and forever here,
1 am monarch of all I survey,
I am Nicholas Tacchinardi, — hunchbacked, look you,
I am thinking to-night of the little child ;
I asked my fair, one happy day,
I bring fresh showers for the thirsting flowers, . . .
I can go nowhere but I meet,
I cannot love thee, but I hold thee dear — . . . .
I cannot make him dead I
I care not. Fortune, what you me deny ;
I climbed the dark brow of the mighty Helvellyn,
I count my time by times that I meet thee, ....
I die for thy sweet love I Tlie ground,
I do confess thou'rt smooth and fair,
I do not own an inch of land,
I don't go much on religion,
I'tl rather see an empty bough, —
1 dreamed I had a plot of ground,
If aught of oaten stop, or i>astoral song
I fear thee not, O Death ! nay, oft 1 pine
If I couhl ever sing the songs
If I had known in the morning,
If I had thought thou couldst have died,
If it must be — if it must be, O God !
If life awake and will never cease,
If love were what the rose is,
If on the book itself we cast our view,
If on this verse of mine,
I found a fellow-worker, when I deemed,
If, sitting with this little worn-out shoe
Kimball,. .
M. B. Lytton,
Bnlcei; . .
Woochuorth,
Campbell, .
Ji. Southeij,
E. B. Browning,
S. M. B. Piatt,
Wotton, .
Hood,
Qiiarles,
Lowell, . .
Beers, . .
B. W. Procter
Croivne, . .
Allen, . .
Wither, . .
G. ,S'. Hillard.
Webster, .
F. Smith, .
Tennyson, .
S. T. Coleridge,
Bryant, . .
jr. Collins,
Milton, . .
Grahame, .
J. T. Fields
Crabbe, . ,
Masse;/, . .
E. B. Browning,
Dana, . . .
A. A. Procter,
Hemans, . .
F. A. Hillard,
Cranch, . .
Byrom, . .
Lytle, . .
Demarest, .
A. Fields, .
Cowper, . .
J. T. Fields,
J. C. P. Dorr,
S. T. Coleridge,
Shelley, .
Cotton, .
F. Smith,
Pierpont,
Thomson,
Scott, . .
Gilder, .
B. W. Procter,
Ayfon, . ,
Larcom, .
Hai/, . . ,
Phelps, . ,
A. Cary,
W. Collins,
Hayne, . ,
Stoddard, .
Sane/. 'iter, ,
Wolfe, . .
D. Grai/,
Holland, .
Sicin hurne,
JJrydeii.
E. Arnold,
O'Sham/hnessy
M. n. Smith, .
320
841
46
cm
110
521
64
420
676
741
451
356
32
445
179
14
6Gs
269
630
509
575
141
78
145
3M0
239
226
169
368
689
181
441
262
827
176
705
353
183
224
161
227
194
710
492
1.54
509
422
596
481
232
446
798
332
730
417
121
147
257
542
4(38
664
822
275
555
204
22
404
513
INDEX TO FIB ST LINES.
867
If those, who live in shepherd's bower, .
If tliou wert by my side, my love, . . .
If thou wouldst view fair Melrose aright,
If to be absent, were to be,
If, when you labor all the day, ....
If you love me, tell me not ;
I gave my little girl back to the daisies,
I gazed upon the glorious sky, ....
I give thee treasures hour by hour, . .
I greet thee, loving letter —
1 grew assured before I asked, ....
I haf von funny leedle poy,
I have a little kinsman, . '
I have been sitting alone,
I have had iilayniates, 1 have had companious
1 hear it often in the . Proctor, ... 448
Winter, ...... 660
Cniiirli, 719
Shiuns, 502
/,'. SjK'n.ft-r 526
A/liiiqham, .... 18
Burn's 698
E. Spenser, .... 524
Tennyson, 578
Cou-per 158
E. I). I'roctor, ... 446
Milton, 378
Trench 606
Sargent 471
Buchanan, 807
Hopkins, 829
Wordsicorth, .... 676
T. B. Aid rich, ... 12
Prentice 847
S. H. Pal f re I/, ... 847
S. T. Coleridge, ... 140
Stonj, 543
If. Morris, .... 390
Preston, 435
Sipnonds, 560
E. D. Proctor, ... 447
E. B. Browning, . . 60
Hai/ne, 257
Uriimmond, .... 198
r. Campbell, .... 114
Gilder, 233
Landor, 327
Tapper 620
Lai(/hton, 324
Moore, 386
Pof/ers, 464
Ecii/, 222
Bennett 38
If. ir. Lonr/fellow, . . 345
Hau, ..'.".... 254
A. 'Bronte', 53
Eabcr, 216
Chiitterton, .... 810
Dickens, 187
J. T. Fields, .... 226
Webster, 631
Mackag, 365
Bnian't, 72
W'illiams, 650
Spoiford, 531
llon-e 200
Thomson, 596
A]iphton, 19
Beottie, 34
Gilder 231
Uoqers, 461
Faber, 216
Blunt 802
Burbidoe 808
S. M. B. Piatt, . . . 421
872
INDEX TO FIRST LINES.
Oh, Life, I breathe thee in the breeze, Bryant, . .
Oh, listen to the howling sea, Curtis, . .
Oh, long the weary vigils since you left me — . . . . Moid ton, .
Oh, many are the poets that are sown, U'ordsicorth,
Oh, miserable comfort ! Loss is loss, Tnntch, . .
Oh ! nature's noblest gift— my gray goose-quill, . . . JJi/ron, . .
Oh ! never did a mighty truth prevail, ....... Talfourd, .
Oh ! not in strange portentous way Cootidge, .
O hour of all hours, the most blessed upon earth, . . . It. B. Lytton, .
Oh ! say can you see by the dawn's early light, .... Key, . . .
Oh, the broom, the yellow broom ! .'....... M. How'itt, .
Oh, the earth and the air ! McKay, . .
Oh, the green things growing, Crailc, . .
Oh ! there are looks and tones that dart, Moore. . .
Oh, the soul-liaunting shadows, J. T. Fields,
Oh ! the ^\orld gives little of love or light, E. Cook,
Oh, to be back in the cool summer shadow, P. Cary,
Oh ! watch you well by daylight, . Loiter, . .
Oh ! welcome, Bniliie, . .
Oh, what shall I do, dear, Clemmcr, .
Oh ! when 'tis summer weather, Boivlcs, . .
"Oh, where hae ye been, my ain Johnnie?" .... Ome, . . .
Oh, who Cabul's sweet region may behold Micliell,
Oh! who shall lightly say that Fame, Baillie, . .
Oh! why should the spirit of mortal be proud? . . . Kno.r, . .
Oh, yet we trust that, somehow, good, Tennyson, .
Oh ! yield not, thou sad one, to sighs, Lover, . .
O lassie ayont the hill ! Macdonald,
Old frienils and dear ! it were ungentle rhyme, . . . . H. H. Browned,
Old house, how desolate thy life ! Hiram llich.
Old neighbor, for how many a year, Spofford,
O Liberty, thou goddess heavenly bright, Addison.
O little feet ! that such long years, H. W. Longfellon
love, come back, across tlie weary way, Marston, .
O Love Divine, that stoopedst to share Holmes, . .
O lovely Mary Donnelly, it's you I love the best ! . . . Allini/lutm,
O loving God of Nature ! . . . Miller, . .
" O Mary, go and call the cattle home, Kinqslei/, .
O may Ijoin the choir invisible, G. Eliot.
O Memory ! thou fond deceiver, Goldsmith,
O mystic, mighty flower whose frail white leaves, . . Barr, . .
One adequate support irordsworth.
Once, in the flight of ages past, Montgomery,
Once, looking from a window on a land Gilder, . .
Once on a time the days of the week, CrancJi, . .
Once on my mother's breast, a child, I crept, .... Hmcells,
Once upon a midnight dreary, Poe, . . .
One by one the sands are flowing . ... A. A. Procter,
One more unfortunate, Hood, . .
One reads to me JIacaulay's "Lays," ....... Gusiafson. .
One sujnmer day, when liirds flew high, M. M. Bodge,
One sweetly solemn thouiiht P. Cary,
One word is too often profaned .Shellei/.'. .
On Linden, when the sun was low, Campbell, .
Only a little child, Haqeman, .
Only a tender little thing, Spofford, .
Only waiting till the shadows, Mace, . .
On the cross-beam under the Old South bell, .... If'illi's, . .
On the eighth day of jNIaroh it was, some people say, . Lover, . .
On the Kialto Bridge we stand ; Howells,
On the iJiiihi Kulm we stood, Holland,
On the Salibath-day A.Smith, .
On thy fair bosom, silver lake ! Perciral, .
On what foundations stands the warrior's pride, . . . S.Johnson,
Open the gates of the Temple ; Mace, . .
O pilgrim, comes the night so fast? Thaxter, .
O popular applause ! wluit heart of man, Cowper, . .
O reader ! hast thou ever stood to see, 11. Southey,
O Science, whose footsteps wander, Fawcett,
INDEX TO FIRST LINES.
873
O sleep ! it is a gentle thing, . . ......
O sovereign Master ! stern and splendid power,
O still, white face of perfect peace, ....
O tenderly the hiiughty day
O the generations old,
O the splendor of the city,
O Thou, bv Nature taught, .......
O Thou, great Friend to all the sons of men,
O Thou, who dry'st the mourner's tear ! . .
O Time ! who know'st a lenient hand to lay, .
O treacherous conscience ! while she seems to sleep,
O trifling tasks so often done .
Our birth is hut asleep and a forgetting, . .
Our Fatherland ! and woukVst thou know, .
Our funeral tears from different causes rise, ,
Our (iod is all we boast below
Our life is nothing but a winter's day ; . . .
Our life is twofold ! Sleep hath its own world,
Our old brown homestead reared its walls, .
Our old colonial town is new with May : . .
Our revels now are ended ; these our actors,
Out of the clover and blue-eyed grass, . . .
Out of the deep.'i of heaven,
Out of the focal and foremost fire, ....
Out of the thousand verses you have writ,
Outside the mad sea ravens for its prey — . .
Out upon it ! 1 have loved,
Over my window the ivy climbs, .....
O weathercock on the village spire
O winter, wilt thou never, never go ? . . . .
O world
O ye tears ! O ye tears ! that have long refused to flow,
O ye uncrowned but kingly kings
O youth of the world,
S. T. Coleridge
Tha.Tfer, . .
J). JL Ooodale,
Emerson, . .
J. G. WhUtier,
E. D. Proctor,
W. Collins,
Parker, , . .
Moore, . . .
Bowles, . . .
E. Yoiurg, . .
Allen, . . .
Woi'clsworth, .
Lover, . . .
E. Younf/, . .
Goldsmith,
Quarles, . .
Byron, . . .
P. Cary, . .
Ahhey, . . .
Slidkespeare, .
K. P. Osgood,
iStoddart/, . .
Ticliwr, . .
T. B. Aldrich.
Movlton, . .
Slid:! in f/, . .
M. M. Dvdqe
H. W. Loniife.
D. Gruji, ' . .
E. B. linncning,
MucLinj, . .
Aiken, . . .
A. Fields, . .
lloiv.
Pack clouds away, and welcome day, . .
Paddy I\IcCabe was dying one day, . . .
Pain and pleasure both decay,
Pain is no longer pain when it is past, . .
Pardon the faults in me,
Passionate, stormy ocean,
Passions are likened best to floods, . . .
Pause not to dream of the future before us,
Perplext in faith, but pure in deeds, . . .
Persia ! time-honored land ! who looks on thee,
Pleasures lie thickest where no pleasiu-es seem ;
Poet, whose sunny span of fruitful years, . .
Poor lone Hannah,
Poor soul, the centre of my sinful earth, . .
Poor, withered face, that yet was once so fair,
Praver is the soul's sincere desire,
" Pray, what do they do at the Springs ?" . .
Press on ! there's no such word as fail ! . .
Princes ! and you most valorous, ....
Prouil mountain giant, whose majestic face, .
Prune thou thy words, the thoughts control, .
Purple, the passionate color, ......
Heytvood, ..... 268
Lover, 748
Stoddard 542
Preston, 435
C. G. Possctti, . . . 466
Hopkins, 828
Paleiqh, 452
F. S.' Osgood, ... 402
Tenmison, .575
Mich'ell, 370
Blanchard, .... 801
Bunner 807
Larcom, 320
Shakespeare, .... 489
G. P. Luthrop, ... 336
Montgomery, .... 383
Saxe 776
Benjamin 799
Dobson, .190
Boker, 43
Kemnan, 396
F. Smith, 508
Quaint blossoms with the old fantastic name.
Queen and huntress, chaste and fair, . . .
Jackson 832
Jonson, 310
Pat-tat it went upon the lion's chin, . .
Rattle the window, winds, .
Ked leaf, gold leaf
Remember Him, the only One
Remember me when I am gone away, . .
" Repine not, O my sou ! " the old man replied,
Hnod, . . .
. . 738
. . .541
Huti'hinson. .
. . 830
Lnrjririis, . .
. . 338
C. G. Hossetti,
. . 465
Jl. Southeij, .
. . 516
874
INDEX TO FIRST LINES.
Restless forms of living light,
Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky,
Rivers that roll most musical in song,
Sacred and secret hand !
Sad is our youth, for it is ever going,
Sad is the thought of sunniest days,
Saint Augustine ! well hast thou said,
Sauntering hither on listless wings
Say over again and yet once over again,
Say, why are beauties jn-aised and honored most, . . .
Say why was man so eminently raised,
Say, ye opprest by some fantastic woes,
Scarce had the earliest ray from Chinon's towers, . .
Scorn not the sonnet. Critic, you have frowned, . . .
Sea-king's daughter from over the sea, .......
Seated one day at the organ
See how the orient dew,
Seek not to walk by borrowed light,
See you yonder castle stately ?
Send down Thy winged angel, God !
September waves his golden-rod,
Serve God and be cheerful. The motto
Seven women loved him. When the wrinkled pall, . .
She did not sigh for death, nor make sad moan, . . .
She i)ose,
The world goes up and the world goes down
The world is still deceived with ornament,
The world is too much with us ; late and soon, ....
The wretch condemned with life to part, ••....
The Yankee boy, before he's sent to school,
They are all goiie into the world of light,
They come ! tlie merry summer months of beauty, song,
and flowei's
The years have linings just as goblets do :
They sat and combed their beautiful hair
They seemed to those who saw them meet,
They sin who tell us love can die,
They told me in my earlier years
They wait all day unseen by us, unfelt ;
Tliey whose hearts are whole and strong
Think not some knowledge rests with thee alone, . . .
Think not your duty done wlien, sad and tearful, . . .
This child, so lovely and cherub-like,
This circulating principle of life
Tliis is Goethe, with a forehead,
This is that hill of awe,
This is where the roses grew,
This man whose homely face ynu look upon,
This name of mine the "sun may steal away,
Tliis only grant me, that my means may lie,
This sweet child that hath climbed upon my knee, . .
This tempest sweeps the Atlantic ! — Nevasink, . . .
Those evening bells ! those evening bells !
Those we love truly never die,
'■ Thou and 1 ! "
Thou art not dead ; thou art not gone to dust ; . . . .
Tliou art, O God ! the life and light,
Thou art with me, here, upon the banks
Thou, Bavaria's bro\\n-eyed daughter,
Thou blossom bright with Autumn dew,
Thou dear, misunderstood, maligned Delay,
Tliou first, l)est friend that heaven assigns below, . . .
ThouLili absent long
Till ■ugh Reason through Faith's mysteries see, . . . .
Thouglit is deeper than all speech,
Though wronged, not harsh my answer !
Thougli you should come again to-morrow
Thou goest : to what distant place,
Thou happy, happy elf !
Thou hast sworn by thy (iod, my Jeanie,
Thou knowest, O my Father ! Why should I, ....
Thou ling'ring star,' with less'niiig ray,
Thou lone companion of the spectred night
Thou miglilier than Manoah's son, ........
Thou Shalt have sun and shower from heaven above, .
Tliou unrelenting Past !
Thou whose birth on earth,
Three fishers went sailing away to the West
Tliree, only three, my darling
Three poets in three distant ages born,
Three roses, wan as moonlight and weighed down, . .
Tliree weeks to-day had old Doctor Drollhead, ....
Q'hrough her forced, abnormal quiet,
Through love to light ! Oh, wonderful the way, . . .
Through the dark path, o'er which I tread,
Thus doth beauty dwell,
Thus is it over all the earth !
Thy bright brief day knew no decline—
Thaxfer, 587
Symonds 559
E. D. Proctor, ... 448
Lantlor, 743
Brine, 806
Winter, C62
Kinfisley. .'521
Sluikfifpeari' 485
Jf '(ird.twort/i, .... ()75
Goldsmith, .... 237
I'ierpont, 764
J'au(/han, 621
Motherwell, .... 304
C. F. Bates 31
Perni 414
Lord Houqhton, ... 288
P. Soulhe'y, .... 517
E. Cook 150
iM. M. Dodge, .... 192
Larcom, ,333
jr/iieler, 633
Piieliardmn 4.58
Poi/vrs, 461
Sir H. Tai/lor, ... 570
ir. A. Butler, ... 88
Bret Harte, .... 252
Allen, 15
Stoddard, 540
G. Houghton, .... 285
Cowley, 1.55
Pealf, 457
Simmit 503
Moore .387
J. B. O'Peilhi, ... 400
Tilton, ..'.... 599
B. Taylor, 567
Moore, 387
Wordsu-orth 667
B. Taylor, 569
Bri/ant, 77
Sa'xton, 852
Pofjers 403
Wordsworth, .... 666
Cou'ley, 156
Cranch, 175
Simms, ...... 503
S. T. Coleridge, ... 710
Si/monds, 559
liood, 734
Cunningham, .... 179
J. C. R". Dorr, ... 195
Biirns 82
Wolcot, 664
Tupper 616
Stedman 539
Bryant 73
Swinhurne, .... 556
Kingsley, 321
Holme, 276
Dry den, 204
T. B. Aldrich, ... 10
Anonymous 796
Halpme, 726
Gilder 233
Boker, 804
Akenside 7
Holland, 273
Moir, 381
INDEX TO FIRST LINES.
879
Tiger ! Tiger ! burning bright, Blake, . .
Till the slow davliglit pale, Greenwell, .
Time, hath, my lord, a wallet at his back, ShaLt'sjyeare,
Time] in advance, behind him hides his wings, , . . . E. Young, .
Tincture or svrup, lotion, drop, or pill, Crahhc, . .
Tired of play"! tired of play ! JFil/is, . .
'Tis a fearfvil night in the winter time, Eastman, .
'Tis all a great show f"«7/. • • •
'Tis a story told bv Kalidasa, — Bostiricl; .
'Tis greatly wise to talk with our past hours ;....£'. Youii;/, .
'Tis not stringing rhymes together, Hanri/al, .
'Tis said that when the nightingale Jiobcrtgon, .
'Tis self whereby we suffer, Symoiids, .
'Tis sweet to hear a brook, 'tis sweet, S. T. Coleridge,
'Tis the part of a coward to brood, Hayne, . .
'Tis time this heai-t should be unmoved, ...... Byron, . .
Titan ! to whose immortal eyes, Byron, . .
To be, or not to be, that is the question, — SliaLexpeare,
To-dav the sunshine freely showers, Prescotf, .
To him who, in the love of Kature holds, Bryant, . . .
Toiling across the Mer de Glace, T. B. Aldrich,
Toil on ! toil on ! ye ephemeral train Stgourney,
Too late I stayed — forgive the crime — ...... Spencer, . .
To learning's second seats we now proceed Crabbe, . .
Toll, tower and minster, toll, H. H. Brovnell,
To Love in my heart, 1 exclaimed, t'other morning, . . Ca^nphell,
To miry places me the hunters drive, Trench, .
To-morrow has trouble to lend, Kimball,
To Thee, fair Freedom, 1 retire SJienstone,
Touch us gently. Time, B. W. Procter,
To you, my purse, and to none other wight Chancer,
Tread lightly, she is near, . . . ■ O. Wilde.
Tread softlv! bow the head— C. B. Sonthey,
Triumphal arch, that fill'st the sky, Campbell, .
True A\it is nature to advantage th-essed, Pope. . . .
'Twas at the royal feast, for Persia won, iJryden, . .
'Twas August, and the tierce sun overhead, M. Arnold,
'Twas in .tune"s bright and glowing prime, ..... Street, . .
'Twas May ! the spring with magic bloom Street. . .
'Twas the last tight at Fredericksburg, — Gassaway,.
Two angels, one of Life and one of Death, H. W. Longfelloic,
Two children, in two neighbor villages Tennyson,
Two hands upon the breast, Craih\ .
Two honest tradesmen meeting in the Strand, .... Byrom, .
Two maidens listening to the sea — Webster,
Two things love can do, Phelps, .
Two travellers of conceited cast, Merrick,
Tying her bonnet under her chin, Perry, .
Under the coffin-lid there are roses : . . . .
Under the lindens lately sat,
Unfading Hope ! when "life's last embers burn.
Unfathomable Sea ! whose waves are years, .
Uidike those feeble gales of praise, ....
Unusual darkness broods ; and growing, gains.
Up from the meadows rich with corn, . . .
Up from the south at break of day, ....
Upon the sadness of the sea
Upon the white sea sand,
Venomous thorns that are so sharp and keen,
S. M. B. Piatt,
Landor, .
Campbell,
Shelley, .
Moore, .
Thomson,
J. G. Whittier,
Bead, .
Thaxter,
Brotcn, .
Wyatt, .
A'erily the fancy may be false, Tapper,
Verse, a breeze, mid blossoms straying, S. T.Coleridge,
Victoria's sceptre o'er the deep, Campbell ,
Virtue, forever frail, as fair, below, E. Yinnig,
Virtue ! without thee, Thomson,
Wall, no ! I can't tell whar he lives Hay, . .
Wanton droll, whose harmless play, Baillie, .
880
INDEX TO FIRST LINES.
Want passed for merit at her open door :
Was this the singer 1 had heard so long?
Waters al)ove ! eternal springs !
We are all here \
We are as clouds that veil the midnight moon ; . . .
We are born ; we laugh ; we weep ;
We are ever waiting, waiting,
We are face to face, and between us here,
We are living — we are dwelling, .
We are not always equal to our fate
We are the sweet flowers,
We are two travellers, Koger and I,
We are wrong always, when we think too much, . . .
Weary of myself, and sick of asking
We count the broken lyres that rest,
Wee, modest, crimson-tipped liower,
Weep not for me ; —
We have been friends together,
We indeed have heard,
Welcome, silence ! welcome! peace !
We light on fruits and flowers, and purest things : . .
We live in deeds, not years ; in thoughts, not breath ; .
We live not in our moments or our years,
Well, I confess, ] did ni>t guess
Well might red slianie my cheek consume !
We may not choose !
We merry three, . • . . ■
We must have doves and serpents in our heart ! . . .
We're all alone, we're all alone !
Were I at Petra, could I not declare,
Werther had a love for Charlotte,
We sat by tlie olioerless fireside,
We should fill the liours with the sweetest things, . .
We that were friends, yet are not now,
We two have grown up so tiivinely together,
We walk alone through all life's various ways, . . . .
We watched her breathing through the niglit, . . . .
We were not many, — we who stood,
What ails this heart o' mine ?
What! and not one to heave the pious sigh?
What a time since 1 wrote ! — I'm a sad, naughty girl, .
What could tliey be but ha[)py ? balanced so, ... .
Wliat frightens you thus, my good son ?
AVhat hcartaclie, — ne'er a hill *
What if tlu; foot, ordained the dust to tread,
Wliat is hope? A smiling rainbow,
AVhat is it tliat doth spoil tlie fair adorning,
What is the dearest happiness of heaven?
What is the little one flunking about?
What lies beyond the fair horizon's rim?
What love do 1 bring you?
What makes a hero ? not success, not fame,
What man can hear sweet sounds and dread to die ?
What man is he that boasts of fleshly might, . . . .
Wliat memory fired lier pallid face,
" W'liat need lias tlie singer to sing?"
Wliat sliall 1 do Willi all the days and hours,
" What shall 1 sing?" I sighed, and said
What's hallowed ground ? Has earth a clod,
What sounds arouse me from my slumbers light?. . .
Wliat though I sing no other song?
AVhal thou-h not all
What though sliorl thy date!
Wliat though the i-hilly wide-mouthed quacking, . . .
What thought is folded in thy leaves !
What to do to make thy fame,
What wak'st tliou, Spring? Sweet voices in the woods.
What war so cruel, or what siege so sore,
What was 1 cannot tell — Ikou kuow'st our story, . . .
Dry den, 206
Crancli, 173
J'aw/lian, 624
Spragnc 533
Hhcllcij, 495
B. W. Procti')\ ... 444
C. IJ. IV. Browndl, . CO
P. Cary, 123
Coxe, 816
Simmn 502
Hunt 299
Troifbridge, .... 786
E. Ji. />n)wning, . . (56
Arnold, 25
Holmes, 276
Burns, 83
Newman, 396
Norton, 398
Crabbe, 163
Bloom/ield, .... 42
Trench, 605
r. J. Bailey, .... 26
Trench, 005
Hood, 737
Trowbridge, .... 612
JacL-soii, 830
MacLay, 756
Quarle's, 451
,Spofford, .530
Tapper, 619
ThncLeray, .... 783
Stoddiird, 542
Dickinson, 188
Lord Howjhton, ... 288
Trowbridije, .... 613
E. Gray, 240
Hood, 281
Hoffman, 270
Blamire, 40
n. Soatheij, .... 519
Moore, 760
J!. Browning, .... 71
M. Prior, 774
Lanier 328
Pope 430
Carh/le, 119
A. Van/ 122
Coolidqe, 813
Holland 272
Jennison, 833
Spofford 531
air H. Tail lor, ... 571
A. T. De i'ere, ... 186
E. Spenser 528
Spofford 529
J. ('. /!. Dorr, . . . 194
Kemble 317
J. J. Piatt, .... 418
Campbell, 108
Sarqent, 471
Winter 661
Akensidc, 6
E. Younq, 683
S. T. Coierid(/e, ... 710
T. B. Aldrich, ... 11
Mack at/, 365
Hemans 260
E. Spenser 525
Howe 28»
INDEX TO FIRST LINES.
881
What, what is virtue, but repose of miiul,
What wondrous power from heaven upon thee wrought '.
What would I save thee from, dear heart ! . .
What would life keep for me if thou should'st go
When at eve 1 sit alone,
When beeches brighten early May, . . , . .
When Britain first, at Heaven's command, . .
When brooks of summer shallow run, ....
When by the evening's quiet light,
When chance or cruel business parts us two, .
When chapman billies leave the street, . . .
When chill November's surly blast
When coldness wraps this suffering clay, . . .
Whene'er with haggard eyes 1 view,
When eve is purpling cliff and cave,
When first 1 looked into thy glorious eyes, . .
When first religion came to bless the land, . .
When first the bride and bridegroom wed, . .
When first the soul of love is sent abroad, . .
When first thy eyes unveil, give thy soul leave.
When freedom from her mountain height, . .
When, from the sacred garden driven, ....
When God at first made man,
When I am dead, my dearest,
When I am turned to mouldering dust, ....
When I behold what pleasure is Pursuit, . . .
When I beneath the cold red earth am sleeping,
When I consider how my light is spent, . . .
When 1 have fears that I may cease to be, . .
When in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes,
When I shall be divorced, some ten years hence.
When I shall go,
When Israel, of the Lord beloved,
When 1 was dead, my spirit turned,
When last the maple bud was swelling, . . .
When love is in her eyes,
When maidens such as Hester die,
When May, with cowslip-braided locks, . . .
When men in health against yhysicians rail.
When Music, heavenly maid, was young. . . .
When once thy foot enters the church, be bare,
When some proud son of man returns to earth.
When the drum of sickness beats,
When the lessons and tasks are all ended, . .
When the rose is brightest
When the sheep are in the fauld,
When the stern genius, to whose hollow tramp.
When to any saint 1 pray,
When to soft Sleep we give ourselves away, . .
When to the sessions of sweet silent thought, .
Where are you, Sylvia, where ?
Where did you come from, baby dear? . . . .
Where honeysuckles scent the way,
Where is the dust that has not been alive? . .
Where is thy favored haunt, eternal voice, . .
Where now the rill, melo.oyc8JLo\A9.
X'S' '/L-
76
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